Professor Combines Research in Education and Peace Studies
January 17, 2012
Visiting Assistant Professor Andria Wisler is using her unique background in peace studies and comparative and international education to make major contributions to the field of peace education.
In addition to teaching, Wisler serves as the director of the Program on Justice and Peace. With many students on campus devoted to extracurricular service, the program offers students a place to investigate and understand the “histories, background, and theories” of their service. She explained, “We are an academic outlet and home for students who do a lot of community-based work.” Georgetown’s program differs from many other universities by combining social justice and peace studies. This influence from the Jesuit tradition adds domestic work to a typically international field.
“I was very much focused internationally before I came here. I can’t say that social justice was a big part of my peace studies upbringing. It’s something that I’ve learned along the way.” She continued, “Now I always think to myself, ‘How could it not be a part of this field of peace studies, [including] this work that’s not just about peace but for peace?’”
Wisler’s courses and research are firmly rooted in understanding the history and strategies of nonviolence. Peace education goes beyond studying peace, but also seeks to change how people view conflict and the mechanisms they use to solve disputes. “You could teach about war and poverty in a way that actually upholds the systems that create war and poverty. Or you could teach about war and poverty in ways that try to deconstruct those systems,” she said.
“In peace studies, you can’t disconnect the content from the pedagogy: the what from the how. How you bring [material] to the classroom community is just as important as what that material is,” she explained. In her current research projects, Wisler is examining the best ways to teach peace education in both the community and in the classroom.
In collaboration with Celina del Felice of Argentina, Wisler is editing a new book, Peace Education Evaluation: Learning from Experience and Exploring Prospects (to be published in 2012). The book will focus on how to assess the growing number of peace education programs that are administered by government agencies, nonprofit organizations, and institutions. The field currently lacks literature devoted to evaluating these specific programs, which often must prove their success in order to secure funding. Wisler insists that standard education measures are not sufficient for peace education, which isn’t “just about building content and knowledge but about changing attitudes and behaviors.”
“Education is seen as this panacea for countries that are developing or countries that are coming out of war or violent conflict. Yet we are still using the old measures to evaluate their success,” she continued. “We are asking education to do a lot more than two plus two equals four. We’re asking it to reconcile ethnic groups and be a major part of the peace building process, but you can’t necessarily quantitatively and traditionally measure that.” Wisler is directing the new volume toward the peace education community—teachers, donors, and administrators—seeking to challenge current timelines and views that dictate great change in short periods.
Wisler was also recently approached by Routledge press, who recruited her to write a new introductory textbook for peace and conflict studies. For this project, she wants to use the “social justice framework” from the university’s program. “I think it will be a huge contribution that I can make, and thus Georgetown can make, to the field on a whole,” she said.
Many college educators are not trained specifically in peace studies because it is still a relatively young field. With this in mind, Wisler intends to create a text that is user-friendly for students and instructors, and wants the book to be a “support system” for professors who are trying to start or expand peace studies programs at their schools.
“The field is growing out of its normal box of small liberal arts colleges and religiously affiliated institutions like Jesuit and Mennonite universities. I’m so excited to be a part of what that growth and development is going to look like.”
—Elizabeth Wilson
Photos by Kuna Hamad
