July 20, 2010 — Last week, we were thrilled to announce that one of our partners in the field of conflict resolution, India-based Meta-Culture, has been chosen to receive the Outstanding Leadership Award from the Association for Conflict Resolution.

The ramifications of conflict first truly resonated with me in the winter of 2008-2009. I was sitting in a small café in a suburb of Tel Aviv, studying for the exams that would wrap up my six-month-long program in Israel. My friend suddenly turned her computer towards me, brushing aside scattered note cards and study guides, to display the breaking headlines of violence in the Gaza Strip.

When Marjorie Ingalls described her internal conflict about having conversations with her kids about Israel on the Web site for Tablet Magazine, she received some strong responses from readers. That’s no surprise, since there is a wide range of deeply held viewpoints and emotions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict within the Jewish community.

In this talk entitled, "Getting to We: Why Dialogue Matters in Higher Education," Patricia Romney, President and founder of the consulting group Romney Associates, explores the importance of dialogue in higher education suggesting that the mission of higher education is to "build the intellectual aptitudes and the experience of engagement with others as well as the affective orientation that fosters the building of a better world, a world in which we can f