NEW YORK CITY--This summer, Teachers College, Columbia University, will begin offering a series of graduate courses leading to a certificate of attendance in conflict resolution--training individuals to deal with interpersonal and intergroup conflicts in schools and other settings.

The concentration, which will involve 12 to 18 credits of courses--12 of which can be counted toward the Master of Arts degree in Social and Organizational Psychology at Teachers College, if the student is accepted into this degree program. They can also be taken as a discrete group of courses by individuals who are not pursuing a degree.

The Teachers College concentration in conflict resolution is grounded in theory and practice developed in the field of social and organizational psychology. A certificate of attendance may prepare individuals for possible professional positions not only in school settings but also in business and industry, non-profit organizations, and government.

Graduate studies in conflict resolution at Teachers College are offered at two levels: 1) basic theory and practice for those who wish to develop their own conflict resolution skills; and 2) train-the-trainer experience for those staff developers who wish to teach others.

Faculty members will come from the College's interdisciplinary International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution (ICCCR) and will include well-established trainers, mediators and researchers. The courses build on the work of Morton Deutsch, Edward Lee Thorndike Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Education and one of the world's foremost theorists in conflict resolution. Professor Deutsch continues to lead the ICCCR.

Ellen Raider, director of training with the ICCCR, has developed methods and materials that are used around the globe. Her Guide to International Negotiations has been used by corporations and international governmental organizations and has been adapted and translated into French and Spanish for use by the worldwide staff of UNICEF. She is the coauthor of Conflict Resolution: Strategies for Collaborative Problem Solving, which has been used by schools, colleges, health care providers and attorneys and has been adapted for use by trained conflict resolution specialists in all the New York City High Schools, the Texas Association of School Administrators for training site-based decision making teams, and adapted/translated by the Ethnic Conflict Resolution Project in Macedonia.

For more information, contact the ICCCR at Box 53, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027 or call 212-678-3289. You can also fax inquiries addressed to Ellen Raider at 212-678-4048.

Published Tuesday, Sep. 18, 2001