About Peaceconferencing

The concept of teaching peaceful negotiation strategies to high school students originated at the Bishop’s School in La Jolla, California as a direct result of the classroom experience during and immediately after the events of 9-11. Students turned to the internet, their medium for information, to understand the dynamic stream of events that was tragically unfolding. They needed a methodology to access the internet in “real time” as events happened and more importantly, they needed a sense of hope that global conflict would not always spin into further escalation.

Student teams supported through an open simulation platform studied current real-world conflicts to target one flashpoint area that held particular urgency for the group. A student mediator was selected to bring students, each representing an opposition group, to the negotiation table.

Their collaborative efforts produced peace agreements based on consensus that were sensitive to the needs and fears of the parties in conflict and offered hope for resolution through diplomacy.

Peaceconferencing has now expanded to partnership schools in the United States and Northern Uganda through digital library centers.

Meet the Director

Kristen Druker the founder of Peaceconferencing

For over thirty years, I have been a California secondary school teacher at both a public high school in the Los Angeles area and a private school in La Jolla. During that time I have been pioneering educational reform in the classroom with the help of my students. We were recognized for our work in interdisciplinary – futures education by the California School Board's Golden Bell Award for innovative curriculum and in 2010 -2011 by the Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) Teacher of the Future Award for Peaceconferencing. As founder of the game based simulation Peaceconferencing, the United States Institute of Peace supported our efforts through their Open Simulation Platform (OSP) and help from its originator, Ronald "Skip" Cole, Sea Change Simulations, LLC. I believe it's time to bring technology supported role play to global youth through a website gaming curriculum linked to a network of partnership schools, please feel free to contact me for more information.