Instructors – Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI) – Practice & Training Institute – Center for Justice & Peacebuilding

2010 Instructors

Mishkat al Moumin

Mishkat Al Moumin, PhD is an experienced professor, practitioner, and trainer in a diverse field of studies, including environmental science and public policy, currently teaching at George Mason University and the National Defense University. Dr. Al-Moumin is the former Minister of Environment in the interim Iraqi government of 2004-2005, where she set up the entire structure for this new ministry. In this position she led campaigns to support Iraqi people living in environmentally dangerous areas, and initiated awareness and cleaning projects which addressed rehabilitation issues of the Iraqi Marshlands. She has founded an international NGO, Women and the Environment Organization, which focuses on empowering women and men in local communities to provide for their own security. Prior to this, as a well known Iraqi lawyer, she was an assistant professor of human rights, fundamental rights, and constitutional law at the University of Baghdad, School of Law. She has an MA and a PhD in public international law from the University of Baghdad. She has also graduated as a Mason Fellow, and a Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University where she earned a second Master’s degree in public administration.

Teaching: Environmental Policy and Governance

Lorraine Stutzman Amstutz

Lorraine Stutzman Amstutz is the co-director of the Office on Crime and Justice for Mennonite Central Committee. She serves as consultant and trainer for restorative justice programs having a victim offender mediation component. She has worked in the field of victim offender mediation since 1984. She has co-authored a curriculum entitled “Victim Offender Conferencing in Pennsylvania’s Juvenile Justice System”, The Little Book of Restorative Discipline for Schools, and is the author of The Little Book of Victim Offender Conferencing. She received her BS in social work from Eastern Mennonite University, where in 2002 she was awarded the Distinguished Service Award. She holds a master of social work from Marywood University.

Co-teaching: Restorative Justice: the Promise, the Challenge

Hizkias Assefa

Hizkias Assefa is a professor of conflict studies at Eastern Mennonite University and is an active peacebuilding practitioner and trainer in many parts of the world. Operating out of his base in Nairobi, Kenya, he works as a mediator and facilitator of reconciliation processes at the political and community levels in a number of civil wars in Africa, Latin America, and Asia including Rwanda, Nigeria, Senegal, Sri Lanka, Israel/Palestine, and Guatemala. He has most recently worked in the mediation between the government and the opposition parties involved in the election-sparked violence in Kenya. He has served as consultant to the United Nations, European Union, and international and national NGOs on conflict resolution and peacebuilding under situations of humanitarian disaster. He holds an LLM from Northwestern University, MS in economics and a PhD. in public and international affairs from the University of Pittsburgh.

Teaching: Philosophy and Praxis of Reconciliation

Elaine Zook Barge

Elaine Zook Barge is the Program Director of STAR, an integrated training program of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding. During the 80’s and 90’s she worked with Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) in El Salvador, Nicaragua and Guatemala where she experienced first hand the trauma of war, poverty and resilience as she worked with widows, displaced families and communities. She facilitates STAR trainings at EMU and throughout the US as well as in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Elaine holds a Master of Arts in Conflict Transformation (MA 2003) and a Bachelors’ of Science in Nutrition/Community Development (BS 1984) from Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-teaching: STAR Level I: Breaking Cycles of Violence, Building Healthy Communities
Co-teaching: STAR Level II: Breaking Cycles of Violence, Building Healthy Communities

David Brubaker

David Brubaker is associate professor of organizational studies at Eastern Mennonite University and the practicum coordinator for the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding,s MA program. He has 20 years of experience in workplace mediation, training and organizational consulting. David also has 10 years of management experience, including five years as Executive Director of a community development organization in Arizona. He is the author of numerous articles on conflict transformation and chapters in several books and is a co-author of The Little Book of Healthy Organizations. He earned an MBA in global economic development from Eastern University, and a PhD. from the University of Arizona specializing in religion and organizations.

Co-teaching: Developing Healthy Organizations

Mark Chupp

Mark Chupp is assistant professor of community development at the Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences of Case Western Reserve University. Mark’s work focuses on transforming conflict through community organizing, civic engagement and appreciate inquiry. His work has focused on Central America and US urban neighborhoods. He has an MSW and a PhD in social welfare from Case Western Reserve University.

Teaching: Qualitatative Research for Social Change

Koila Costello-Olsson

Koila Costello-Olsson is the director of the newly formed Pacific Centre for Peacebuilding, based in Suva, Fiji Islands. She has practiced and trained in the areas of domestic violence, women/peace and human security, change management, stress management, trauma healing, and peacebuilding with various sectors in the communities. She has worked throughout the South Pacific and most recently in South Sudan. She has qualifications in social work, social policy and administration and has an MA in conflict transformation from Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-teaching: Transforming Social Narratives to Build Peace

Amy Potter Czajkowski

Amy Potter Czajkowski is the Program Director of Coming to the Table, a program at Eastern Mennonite University that is grounded in the conceptual framework of STAR and applied to the historical trauma of slavery in the US. Amy is an experienced mediator, facilitator and trainer with more than 10 years of experience developing peacebuilding and trauma healing programs. She has her MA in Conflict Transformation from Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-teaching: STAR Level II: Breaking Cycles of Violence, Building Healthy Communities

Jayne Docherty

Jayne Docherty is professor of conflict studies at Eastern Mennonite University. She holds a PhD in conflict analysis and resolution from George Mason University. She consults with organizations and communities in transition, working with them to harness the positive energy of conflict and minimize its negative effects. She specializes in conducting research – especially action research projects – for nonprofit organizations; designing, monitoring and evaluating projects and programs; consulting with universities on curriculum development; and conducting trainings on conflict analysis, negotiation, and program design. Her most recent publications include four chapters in The Negotiator’ s Fieldbook and The Little Book of Strategic Negotiation.

Co-teaching: Developing University-Based Peacebuilding Curricula

Nancy Good

Nancy Good is associate professor of trauma and conflict studies at EMU. A mediator and therapist for more than 30 years, Nancy is a founding partner at Newman Avenue Associates where she works as a mediator, organizational consultant/trainer, and licensed psychotherapist. At CJP, Nancy is a trauma specialist and works in diversity-based conflict (race and gender). Her dissertation explored resilience and posttraumatic growth (PTG) in “Peacebuilders Healing Trauma: From Victim to Survivor to Provider.” She holds an MSW degree from Virginia Commonwealth University and a PhD from Union Institute & University.

Teaching: Trauma Awareness & Transformation

Roy Hange

Roy Hange is co-pastor of Charlottesville Mennonite Church and overseer of the Harrisonburg District of Virginia Mennonite Conference, and an ordained minister in the Mennonite church. He spent 10 years in the Middle East working in the encounter zones between Islam, Eastern Christianity and Western Christianity. He worked with Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) in Egypt (1982-1985); he was the first MCC Country Representative in Syria (1991-97); and with his family, he lived in Qom, Iran in 1998 and engaged in high level religious dialogue. He brings to the task of peacemaking a decade of local knowledge of conflict dynamics in the Middle East and years of interpretative encounters between these three communities in Muslim, Christian and political contexts. He continues to speak and write on the subject of religious peacebuilding. He has an MDiv from Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Indiana.

Teaching: Faith-based Peacebuilding

Barry Hart

Barry Hart is professor of trauma, identity and conflict studies at Eastern Mennonite University. He has worked in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Burundi and Somaliland as well as Northern Ireland and Haiti. His work in the former Yugoslavia included conflict transformation and prejudice reduction training and psychosocial consultation. Dr. Hart recently did a major tolerance assessment in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He is currently the academic director of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University and holds this same position in the Caux Scholars Program, Caux, Switzerland. He received a PhD in conflict analysis and resolution from George Mason University and is the author of the book, Peacebuilding in Traumatized Societies.

Teaching: Identity and Conflict Transformation

David Anderson Hooker

David Anderson Hooker is associate professor at Eastern Mennonite University. He is a mediator, community organizer and peace builder with over 20 years experience, specializing in managing complex, multi-party, and public policy conflicts. He has worked in Bosnia, Croatia, Cuba, Myanmar, Nigeria, Somaliland, Sudan and Zimbabwe. He currently serves as the Director for Research and Training for the Coming to the Table project at EMU, a program in racial reconciliation that connects descendants of former enslaved and enslavers in dialogue processes, educational fora and other justice related healing experiences. He is the former Vice President for Community Building for the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Atlanta Civic Site. In that role, he worked with historically disenfranchised communities in the Atlanta (GA) inner city. In 2004, he was a Fellow with the National Peace Foundation in Washington, D.C. and was a Visiting Professor at Africa University’s ( Mutare, Zimbabwe) Institute for Peace Leadership and Governance. He is the former Senior Program Associate for the National Institute for Dispute Resolution (NIDR) in Washington, DC. He is a graduate of Emory University’s School of Law (JD), the Candler School of Theology (MDiv), the University of Massachusetts in Amherst (MPH and MPA), Washington University in St. Louis (MA Minority Mental Health) and Morehouse College (BS).

Teaching: Multi-Party Problems: Negotiation, Conflict Resolution, and Peacebuilding
Co-Teaching: STAR Level I: Breaking Cycles of Violence, Building Healthy Communities

Alma Abdul-Hadi Jadallah

Alma Abdul-Hadi Jadallah is President and Managing Director of Kommon Denominator, Inc. She advises and works on strategic projects related to conflict prevention and mitigation, training and education, and capacity building on the national and international levels. She has designed and delivered highly successful small and large-scale interventions in corporate, community and international settings. She is a skilled facilitator and is a Virginia Court Certified mediator. She is a board member (Past Chair) of Partners for Peace, Washington, DC, the Advisory Board of the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University, the Board of Directors of Northern Virginia Mediation Services (Past President), a member of the original advisory board for Peace x Peace, and member of Board of Directors, Institute for Victims of Trauma, McLean, VA, and the Advisory Board, Smart Security Project, Eastern Mennonite University, Harrisonburg, VA. She is also a member of the Association for Conflict Resolution and Virginia Mediation Network.

Teaching: Practice: Skills for Conflict Transformation

Randall Puljek-Shank

Randall Puljek-Shank is co-representative for Southeast Europe with Mennonite Central Committee and lives in Sarajevo. His work in this role since 2002 has involved supporting 20 local partner organizations engaged in peacebuilding with focus areas of interreligious dialogue, trauma healing, strategic peacebuilding, and peace education. He is a co-founder of the Post-Yugoslav Peace Academy and the Believers for Peace interfaith network, and a member of the Executive Committee of the NGO Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina. He also previously worked with relief and peacebuilding projects in Bosnia and Herzegovina from 1995-1996, has taught classes in social movements and been a trainer and consultant to peacebuilding projects in Croatia, Serbia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. He holds an MA in Conflict Transformation from Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-Teaching: Capacity Building in Local Organizations

Gloria Rhodes

Gloria Rhodes is associate professor of peacebuilding and conflict studies at EMU, where she chairs the department of Applied Social Sciences and coordinates the Peacebuilding and Development undergraduate program. She teaches peacebuilding theory and practice (including mediation and group facilitation) and conflict theory and analysis. She has served as Administrative Director of the Summer Peacebuilding Institute and as a program assistant for the National Conference on Peacemaking and Conflict Resolution. She has led semester and summer cross cultural programs in Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, and Russia. Her areas of expertise include peacebuilding curriculum development and pedagogy, conflict analysis, practice-related research, group facilitation and mediation, and cross cultural education. She holds a PhD in conflict analysis and resolution from George Mason University.

Teaching: Introduction to Conflict Transformation

Sam Rizk

Samuel Rizk is currently a conflict prevention advisor with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in Yemen. He has also been an adjunct faculty member at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, teaching and co-teaching courses on Strategic Peacebuilding, Conflict Transformation Theory, and Religion, Conflict and Peacebuilding. Living in Lebanon from 2002 to 2006 he was a founding member and executive director of the Forum for Development, Culture and Dialogue – a regional NGO based in Beirut, working on issues of conflict resolution, community empowerment and interfaith dialogue. During that time he also helped establish the Arab Partnership for Conflict Prevention and Human Security and coordinated its work in relation to the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC). Previous experience includes work with the Middle East Council of Churches in Egypt and Lebanon as well as the Ibn Khaldoun Center for Development Studies in Cairo. He holds an MA in Middle East Studies from the American University in Cairo and is a doctoral candidate at the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University.

Co-teaching: Theory: Frameworks for Peacebuilding

Jeanette Romkema

Jeanette Romkema, has over 25 years of experience in international relief and development work, with special expertise in Dialogue Education in the areas of HIV & AIDS, women’s health and community peacebuilding. Previously, she was the “HIV and AIDS Education Animation Coordinator” for the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund of the Anglican Church of Canada. In this capacity she helped raise 3 million dollars for AIDS work in the world, produced numerous education tools, and engaged churches across Canada in education and advocacy initiatives. Presently, Jeanette is a Partner and Senior Trainer for Global Learning Partners, Inc. She is passionate about training groups in the power of Dialogue Education, and designs dialogue-based curriculum for peacebuilding. Jeanette holds a Master of Education in Curriculum, Teaching and Learning and is a PhD candidate in Education at the University of Toronto. She is also a recent graduate of the STAR program at Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-teaching: Designing Learner-Centered Training for Conflict Transformation

Timothy Ruebke

Timothy Ruebke is the Executive Director at the Community Mediation Center (CMC) in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Since 1992, he has extensive experience mediating and facilitating general community, family, workplace, group/multi-party, and criminal circumstances. He is on the following rosters as a mediator: the Supreme Court of Virginia (General District, Juvenile & Domestic Relations, Circuit-Civil, Circuit-Family, and Child Dependency); the USPS REDRESS Program; the USDA – Virginia Agriculture Mediation Program; and, the Virginia Department of Forestry Water Quality Enforcement Mediation Program. He is certified by the Supreme Court of Virginia as a mentor mediator and trainer and has been an adjunct faculty member for James Madison University and Eastern Mennonite University (EMU). Tim is a previous board member of the Virginia Mediation Network (VMN) and the Restorative Justice Association of Virginia (RJAV). He is currently a member of VMN, a board member of the Virginia Association for Community Conflict Resolution and is an Advanced Practitioner member of the Association for Conflict Resolution. He holds an AA degree from Hesston College, a BA in Social Work from EMU, and an MA in Conflict Transformation from EMU.

Teaching: Mediation

Lisa Schirch

Lisa Schirch is professor of peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University. A former Fulbright Fellow in East and West Africa, she has worked in over 20 countries with communities and government leaders. She is the program director of the 3D Security Initiative, which promotes civil society perspectives on conflict prevention and peacebuilding in US security policymaking. With colleagues at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding at EMU, Schirch consults with a network of strategic partner organizations involved in peacebuilding activities throughout the U.S., Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Europe. Schirch has written five books and numerous articles on conflict prevention and peacebuilding. Her current research interests include civil-military dialogue and the intersection of security and climate change, sustainable development, the media, and conflict prevention. She is a frequent public speaker and has TV and radio experience discussing U.S. foreign policy. She holds a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Waterloo, Canada, and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from George Mason University.

Teaching: Analysis: Understanding Conflict

Rebecca Spence

Rebecca Spence is the Director of Peaceworks Pty Ltd. She has worked with government and non-government organisations in Fiji, the Solomons, Timor Leste, Papua New Guinea, Bougainville, and Sri Lanka. Rebecca is a former Director of the Centre for Peace Studies at the University Of New England. She has a PhD in Peace Studies from the University of New England.

Co-teaching: Transforming Social Narratives to Build Peace

Carl Stauffer

Carl Stauffer is Assistant Professor of Development and Justice Studies at Eastern Mennonite University. For 15 years Carl worked as a project director and co-founder, lead facilitator, trainer, and curriculum designer for peacebuilding and community development initiatives throughout 20 countries in Africa. More specifically, he focused on the application of development approaches to conflict prevention and post-violence reconstruction efforts at a national and regional level across the African continent. Carl also brings North American domestic experience as an Associate Pastor working at development projects in disadvantaged communities and as Executive Director of a Victim-Offender Reconciliation Program. Carl received his Ph.D. from KwaZulu Natal University in South Africa and is a graduate of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding.

Teaching: Conflict-Sensitive Development and Peacebuilding
Co-Teaching: Capacity Building in Local Organizations

Dan Wessner

Daniel W. Wessner is director of the Master’s in Development Practice program at the University of Denver’s Josef Korbel School of International Studies. This program links campuses, NGOs, and governments in the Americas, Africa, and Asia for collaborative study and research of the Millennium Development Goals. Dr. Wessner’s teaching and research are in just and sustainable development, human rights and international law, and Southeast Asian politics. He is ordained in the Mennonite Church USA and a member of the State Bar of California. He has an MDiv from Princeton Theological Seminary, a JD from University of Virginia, and a PhD in international studies from the University of Denver.

Teaching: Human Rights, Governance, and Peacebuilding

Marshall Yoder

Marshall Yoder is an attorney who is committed to bringing peacebuilding concepts to the law. Among other things, Marshall has an active collaborative law practice, a client-centered process in which the parties and their lawyers commit to resolving disputes outside the courtroom through face-to-face meetings in which the lawyers serve as facilitators and process guides in addition to providing legal advice when required. He has designed and trained in learning events for mediators, lawyers and other professionals using dialogue education, conflict transformation and restorative justice principles. Marshall also serves as an adjunct professor at EMU where he teaches a pre-law capstone course and instructs in the MBA program in the areas of organizational governance and leadership. Marshall has served on the Boards of numerous non-profits and is a member of the Collaborative Practice Training Institute which trains mental health professionals, financial professionals, mediators and attorneys in the use of a multi-disciplinary approach to resolving disputes. He also serves on the Civil Practice Committee of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals, where he works with dispute resolution professionals from throughout the world in educating people about collaborative practice. Marshall uses dialogue education principles both in the classroom and in his practice and sees the model as a natural fit for peacebuilding trainings. He is a graduate of Campbell University School of Law and is currently completing his practicum for his M.A. in conflict transformation from EMU.

Co-teaching: Designing Learner-Centered Training for Conflict Transformation

Howard Zehr

Howard Zehr is professor of restorative justice at Eastern Mennonite University and is considered one of the founders of the restorative justice field. He directed the first victim offender conferencing program in the US and his book, Changing Lenses: A New Focus for Crime and Justice, is considered a seminal book in the field. He is the author of numerous other books and is editor of the Little Books of Justice & Peacebuilding series and the author of two of those books: The Little Book of Restorative Justice and The Little Book of Contemplative Photography. Dr. Zehr frequently lectures and consults internationally. He has received a number of awards and in 2008 was appointed to the Victims Advisory Group of the U.S. Sentencing Commission. He has a PhD from Rutgers University.

Co-teaching: Restorative Justice: the Promise, the Challenge

Ruth Zimmerman

Ruth Hoover Zimmerman is the Mennonite Central Committee Regional Representative for India, Nepal and Afghanistan, based in Kolkata, India. Zimmerman is a former Co-Director of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding. She is a co-author of The Little Book of Healthy Organizations. She holds an MA in conflict transformation with a focus in leadership studies from Eastern Mennonite University.

Co-teaching: Developing Healthy Organizations

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