Global Honors Student Leads Discussion Among Postgraduates at 2024 Notre Dame Peace Conference

Global Honors students at the University of Washington Tacoma (UWT) are known to be exceptionally outgoing when it comes to academic opportunities outside of the classroom, often attending regional and national conferences but this year however, the Global Honors program had a first. Global Honors undergraduate student, Reese Ramirez, had his work accepted to the 2024 Notre Dame Student Peace Conference, a conference comprised primarily of graduate and doctoral students. Thanks to the generous support of The Bamford Foundation and UWT’s Center for Student Involvement, Reese traveled to Indiana in April where he led discussion based on his paper, “Understanding Urban Warfare: A Defiance of Humanitarian Law”.

Reese shared this thoughtful reflection with IDEATE on his time at the 2024 Notre Dame Peace Conference:

“The 2024 Notre Dame Student Peace Conference was an incredible experience and an opportunity to learn about advancing peace around the world. At the conference, I had the chance to hear master's and PhD students share their research on peacebuilding on various topics from Columbian cinema to youth representation in the African Union. Not only was it a great place for learning, but also for meeting people who could share their experiences and perspectives.

In a field that feels desperately hopeful at times, seeing the impacts of academic work was inspiring. At the end of the first day, we heard a powerful talk from Dr. Sa'ed Atshan. He is a Queer, Quaker, Palestinian professor of peace at Notre Dame University. He challenged us to hold onto hope through the dismal and disheartening realities of a violent conflict-ridden world. "It is easy to go on living a simple life," said Dr. Atshan, "It is much harder to give up that simple life to fight for those who can't."  His talk inspired me to recognize desperate hope not as the condition of someone studying peace, but rather as a powerful motivator in a cause worth fighting for.

I am incredibly grateful to Liz Hunt and Conor Leary for organizing travel and accommodations, Dr. Divya McMillin for her support in funding the trip, Dr. Ben Meiches for advising my research, and the team at Notre Dame for planning and hosting the conference.”