Re-Conectando Peace Schools

About the Project

The Re-Conectando Peace Schools are an initiative dedicated to peacebuilding and reconciliation in Colombia, particularly in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta region.

Our goal is to train Arhuaco Indigenous and rural children and adolescents through agile and experiential peacebuilding methodologies that foster emotional, collective, and ecological intelligence among participants.

The funds allocated to this project will support:

the strengthening of social bonds,
the regeneration of local ecosystems through school gardens and native plant nurseries,
and the empowerment of governance processes within the Arhuaco community.

Our Mission

As a Peace School, we believe that reconciliation and peace begin with reconnecting communities to their territories, preserving Indigenous traditional knowledge, and strengthening local governance processes.

We have extensive experience facilitating relationships between international communities and Indigenous peoples, as well as supporting truth and reconciliation processes among different actors affected by conflict.

Our purpose is to nurture individuals who can strengthen territorial peacebuilding efforts and contribute to the resilience of communities impacted by Colombia’s armed conflict.

Our work focuses on three key dimensions:

Emotional Intelligence, helping participants recognize and transform the wounds caused by war.
Collective Intelligence, strengthening social cohesion and community collaboration.
Ecological Intelligence, preserving traditional knowledge and deepening the relationship between people and nature.

Our Approach

We are committed to building peace between communities and nature by promoting the understanding of the natural world as a subject of rights. Beyond serving as a resource for sustaining human life, nature is a living entity with which we coexist and co-create reality.

The Peace Schools are conceived as a long-term, intergenerational strategy designed to educate future generations in:

nonviolent conflict resolution,
territorial conservation,
and the protection of traditional knowledge systems.

We hope that those who participate in our programs will become seeds of transformation, sharing these learnings with other groups and creating local capacities that ensure the long-term sustainability of peacebuilding efforts.

How Do We Educate for Peace?

Our team includes professionals with extensive experience in Colombia’s Comprehensive Peace System, including the Truth Commission, the Unit for the Search of Missing Persons, and the Special Jurisdiction for Peace.

Drawing on this experience, we have developed experiential and participatory educational methodologies that create peacebuilding laboratories through nonviolent direct action.

Our approach educates both in and through conflict, while promoting the strengthening of social and cultural ties as essential foundations for sustaining cultures of peace.

Your support directly funds youth education, community governance initiatives, and ecological regeneration—creating a ripple effect of peace that will resonate for generations to come.