May 3, 2000
Schools participate in Peace Rally
'Piece by Peace' features dancing, drums and Monks
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
"Let's make 600 voices become one!"
The answering roar of voices was music to the ears of the Subtonic Monks, a performance group from Toronto, as they fired up more than 600 elementary school students in the name of peace. The students were gathered last Thursday at Traverse City West High School for the "Piece by Peace," the third annual Traverse City Peace Rally, which featured workshops on peace and ecology led by the Subtonic Monks.
Drawing students in the third through sixth grades from a dozen area elementary schools, the rally used storytelling, dance, music and drum making to spread the message of peace. Nearly 50 high school students plus teachers and counselors from the participating elementary schools helped put on the program.
The day's events culminated with a peace parade that had all the participants marching, drumming and chanting for peace behind the Subtonic Monks' fantasy bicycle.
"The rally is a nice way for kids to get together and meet other kids interested in peace," said Sharon Lund, a social worker at Blair Elementary School. "When they all meet in junior high they know which kids are interested in peace, too. They get to know that other kids think peace is cool and that other kids are not into violence and fighting."
The rally was held to reinforce the teaching and practice of peace for the students who serve as Peacekeepers in their elementary schools' Peacemakers programs. Peacekeepers are student volunteers who patrol the playground at recess times to settle disputes among their peers.
"At first, the kids were saying, 'What do you mean, you're a kid like me you can't help me,'" said Mary Povolo, a social worker at Leeland Public School, which sent 22 sixth- graders and nine teen helpers to the rally. "More and more, the students see Peacekeepers as somebody they should talk to when they have a problem."
The Peacekeepers complete conflict resolution training at the beginning of the school year to learn to settle conflicts using words instead of fists. Conflicts that involve more than two people require the intervention of a teacher, but most of the Peacekeepers' efforts resolve the common playground flare-ups quickly and fairly. Their training has them walk around the conflicting parties a bit to cool them off and then bring them back together to talk over their differences. Each person gets a chance to be heard and they work together to resolve the problem.
"I like being a Peacemaker because you get to help other people," said Evelynne Mende, a fifth-grader at Bertha Vos Elementary and a two-year veteran of the program. "I've made a lot of friends among the younger kids from this. I think the playground is a better place because of the Peacemakers."
For the "Piece by Peace" rally, Mende took a step beyond her role as a Peacemaker and applied for a mini Peace grant from the Traverse City Youth Advisory Council. She used the $100 to purchase supplies and decorate 13 cars that carried 60 Bertha Vos students to West High School for the rally. Their caravan traveled across town to and from the peace rally spreading their own message of peace.
The Peacemakers program originated eight years ago at Blair Elementary School, an outgrowth of the school's improvement committee that formed when the school opened 10 years ago. Lund heard of the peacekeepers program from a television show about another school that had students settle peer conflicts. She took another counselor and later a group of teachers to visit a school in Ann Arbor that had implemented the program.
Each year more schools create Peacekeeper programs, each doing in a slightly different way depending on their school's needs and character. Lund is pleased at the lifetime conflict resolution skills the Peacekeepers are learning.
"The program teaches kids to talk out their problems and work together to come to a mutually agreeable solution," Lund said. "Kids are very proud of being a Peacekeeper and by actually practicing peace over a period of time they incorporate it into their being."