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Student engagement is an important part of the Kindred Credit Union Centre for Peace Advancement’s mission to advance expansive and innovative understandings and practices of peace. Even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, youth have continued to be a resilient, driving force in community change. With an increased willingness to challenge the status quo and keenness to consider fresh perspectives, students have a distinct and important role to play in social innovation.

At the University of Waterloo, innovation and entrepreneurship opportunities are around every corner. Yet in the Spring semester an opportunity arose to rethink how students can be involved in changemaking. What if UWaterloo could provide a space for students to apply their innovative and systems-change mindsets to a real-life, ever-changing problem: the COVID-19 pandemic?

In the spring of 2016, Kirsten Mosey, the Kindred Credit Union Centre for Peace Advancement’s Communications Coordinator, was standing in a refugee camp on the small Greek island of Lesvos.

Growing Hope Farm in Cambridge is a place where Waterloo region residents can purchase organic produce, partake in goat yoga, or visit for a day.

Dear Lowell,

I remember 2010. Doe-eyed and hopeful, I walk up to you after class with four friends and ask to turn our final research assignment into a script for a one-act play. You say, “It’s never been done. Will it be any good?” and try to hold back your smile.

Lunaria, a member of the Epp Peace Incubator, was featured in Global Talent Accelerator’s list of “Five Cana

In the X Page Workshop, stories begin with a word or a phrase. Prompts such as “luggage,” “shoes,” or “teacher” elicit images in the minds of the women who gather together every week. Each participant enters the scene – sometimes humorous, sometimes painful -- in her mind and witnesses the scents, sounds and sights she encounters. These detailed memories are written down and form the basis of a story, which eventually becomes a performance.

Communities Building Youth Futures (CBYF), an ambitious initiative of the Tamarack Institute and the Government of Canada, is a 5-year Collective Impact strategy aimed at increasing graduation rates for youth facing barriers.  By prioritizing a robust youth workforce and collaborative community building strategies, the project helps to reimagine collaboration within small to medium Canadian communities in their support of youth.

Many students engage with the programs and values of The Kindred Credit Union Centre for Peace Advancement on their journey to graduation. The lessons learned and questions asked sit with students who take classes taught by educators in the Centre, catapulting them into high-impact projects and careers.

Yesterday marked the end of the 2019-2020 Map the System journey! As the Global Finals concluded with virtual cheers and applause from hundreds of audience members, the work of 3,500 teams from 52 institutions over the last few months was celebrated. This year’s Map the System competition was the biggest yet, bringing forth a new caliber of systems thinking.