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My name is Victoria Lumax, and I am a fifth-year Honours Arts student, majoring in Peace and Conflict Studies and English. I had the incredible chance to go to the MCC United Nations Office 2022 Student Seminar in New York this past November. Here is what I learned about peace.

Ryan Bromley is a 3A Arts and Business student with a Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) major. Ryan was a fall 2021 Enterprise Co-op pitch winner. Enterprise Co-op (E Co-op) is a co-op pathway that allows students to pursue an entrepreneurial co-op option in which students start their businesses while earning a co-op credit. Ryan’s original pitch was to create a “Peace to co-op” business that would teach university students critical personal and professional skills related to PACS. Throughout the work term, Ryan displayed incredible flexibility, drive, and vision in his journey through the term as he worked towards a dream that extends beyond the four months of the co-op.

With the worldview and perspective from Peace and Conflict Studies, combined with the understanding of systems and policy that Legal Studies provides, Anna is ready to take on the world. Anna is in her 4^th year, studying a double major in Legal Studies and Peace and Conflict Studies, as well as being in the co-op program. After taking PACS 202: Conflict Resolution, Anna Miedema realized the value in having Peace and Conflict Studies as part of her degree. Since then, she has been able to find new ways that PACS can apply to her everyday life as well as her co-op experience.

Entering her undergraduate program at the University of Waterloo, Stephanie Goertz had no idea how a Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) minor would fit into her career or life. Looking back, she reflects that her PACS education is not something she can fit in a box or summarize easily but contributed to an overall perspective. This perspective and mindset have impacted her ongoing learning and how she can connect with others to make a change in her community.

When Abbey began her co-op position last spring, she struggled to see how her Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) education could be relevant to her work. Now that she has finished her co-op position, she can hardly fathom a position where PACS would not apply – at least in some capacity.

Sandra Elgersma is an inspiration for all Undergraduate Peace and Conflict Studies students. Currently, she is a part of the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR). As a UW Alumnus with a Sociology major and PACS minor, she had a passion for helping people in need.

Facilitating workshops, teaching undergraduate courses, mentoring students—Keith Regehr has contributed much to the Conrad Grebel University College community.

Rebecca Chinamasa, a second-year Master of Peace and Conflict Studies student, recently became a member of The Record's Community Editorial Board for 2020-21. Chinamasa joined the MPACS program with a background in healthcare and passion to combine the theory and practice of peace and conflict studies with healthcare services.

By Marlene Epp, Professor of History and Peace and Conflict Studies

Marlene Epp is a professor of history and peace and conflict studies at Conrad Grebel University College at the University of Waterloo. She lives, works, and plays on the traditional territory of the Huron-Wendat, Attawandaron, Anishinaabeg, and Haudenosaunee peoples.

It is somewhat ironic that the Land Back Camp underway at Victoria Park is just a short walk from the Schneider Haus on Queen Street.

The Land Back Camp is where a group of local Indigenous activists began occupying a small area of the park on National Indigenous Peoples Day (June 21). They are claiming land that was a traditional meeting ground for Indigenous peoples, used for trade, ceremony, and relationship building. The land was taken away by white colonizers and settlers, but in 1784 the Haldimand Tract (10 kilometres on each side of the Grand River from end to end) was granted by the British to the Haudenosaunee (Six Nations), to support them in perpetuity.