In 2016, I read a report on Global Peace that revealed a striking fact: countries like India, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq have spent billions of dollars on military expenditures fighting against each other, yet they haven't been able to fight their way to a solution. I thought, what if they had invested even half of those billions in education instead? What would the result have been?
To experience firsthand whether education can truly build peaceful societies, I started this innovation.
Let's Cross the Borders is a 6-week journey where students from conflict zone countries connect, discuss, and commit to nurturing peaceful societies. Here's how it unfolds:
Week 1: Meet Your Peace Buddy
Students are paired across borders—an Indian student with a Pakistani student, for example—and they begin building a personal connection, moving beyond stereotypes to see each other as individuals.
Week 2: Discovering Common Ground
Peace buddies explore the similarities and differences between their countries, often surprised by how much they share despite the conflict.
Week 3: Understanding the Conflict
Students tackle the difficult question: "Why are we fighting?" They examine the roots of conflict from multiple perspectives, fostering critical thinking rather than inherited narratives.
Week 4: Learning from Peace
We invite guest speakers from the world's most peaceful countries, like Finland, who share what it means to live in a peaceful society and how students can contribute to building one.
Week 5: Creating Change
Students draft a Peace Declaration outlining concrete commitments to make their own communities more peaceful and their personal contributions to that vision.
Week 6: Sharing the Vision
Students present their learnings and declarations to other groups, multiplying the impact and inspiring others to join the movement.
In 2017, we partnered with Microsoft Education Community and uploaded our resources on their community platform. Since then, the project has been growing organically year by year.
We run one cycle of the project annually. We announce it through social media and teacher networks, and select 50 teachers from each participating country. Through this approach, we've been able to maintain quality while steadily expanding our reach across conflict zones. Till now we are managing a peace army of 18,000 students from 6 countries.
Yes.
If you are interested in trying this in your school, please write to csr@ranjitsinhdisale.org
