December 2025 Newsletter

In case you missed it:

Young Leaders for Peace Publication

Discover our newest feature on the Peace Leadership Collaborative platform, spotlighting Young Leaders for Peace and its vision for reimagining youth leadership.

The article follows this year’s cohort through a transformative two week experience at the University for Peace, where students explore peace as a lived practice through experiential learning, mindful reflection, and hands on engagement with Costa Rican communities. It captures how YLP nurtures confidence, empathy, and agency in young people, empowering them to return home as catalysts for change in their schools and communities.

Strengthening Peace Education at Teachers College

For more than twenty years, the Peace Education Network (PEN) at Teachers College (TC) has created a space where practitioners, scholars, and activists strengthen Peace Education through shared ideas, lived experience, and skill building. This November, PEN hosted a student supported event that brought together leaders from New York Peace Institute, NYU, Seoul National University, Mediators Beyond Borders International, the Brooklyn Peace Center, and UPEACE’s Permanent Observer to the UN, Ramu Damodaran. The discussion underscored the equal importance of formal and informal learning in peace education and affirmed UPEACE’s guiding belief that if you want peace, work for peace. UPEACE NY is proud to see this collaboration grow, with more TC UPEACE engagement ahead in the new year.

Recent events:

UPEACE NY presents at a Holiday Party with a Soul

Melissa Wild and Krista Smith showcased our Peace is a Practice campaign, bringing the message of peace through public art to a vibrant community gathering in New York.

Their participation highlighted how creative expression can spark dialogue, inspire connection, and strengthen our shared commitment to building a culture of peace.

Innovation in Social Impact and Development

On December 16th, UPEACE NY hosted a special session of the Peace Innovation Webinar Series featuring Heather McGee, CEO of 17 Asset Management, in conversation with Melissa Wild, Executive Director of UPEACE NY. The discussion explored how peace principles can be embedded into social impact and development practice across industries, bringing together diverse perspectives on innovation, finance, and systems change.

Upcoming events:

Save the Date: January 26th | UPEACE Around the World

Following the UN International Day of Education, University for Peace (UPEACE) will host UPEACE Around the World, a global roundtable focused on practical pathways toward sustainable peace in today’s rapidly shifting landscape. The session will bring global voices together with local perspectives from the tangible work for peace the UPEACE regional offices have carried out. In revisiting UPEACE’s long history of fostering regional stability, including its early role in Central America where it hosted some of the region’s first peace dialogues, later recognized by Secretary General Kofi Annan through an expansion of its mandate, this roundtable will highlight key lessons and explore how they can be applied to today’s challenges.

Reflections on Peace:

Message from the President of the General Assembly

On the occasion of UPEACE’s forty fifth anniversary, the President of the General Assembly highlighted the University’s enduring role as an institution created by the United Nations to prepare the next generation of peace leaders. She emphasized that UPEACE has helped advance a vital understanding: peace is not an abstract ideal, but a daily practice grounded in courage, cooperation, and a commitment to our shared humanity. UPEACE’s academic and training programmes equip students with the skills needed for conflict prevention, peacekeeping, and the peaceful settlement of disputes, while also cultivating the understanding, tolerance, and coexistence that multilateralism urgently needs today. As the UN marks its eightieth anniversary and undertakes major reforms, she reminded us that we are “better together” and that institutions like UPEACE demonstrate how a bold and principled new generation of peacebuilders is already stepping forward to shape a more just and peaceful world.

2025 Highlights: Some of Our Favorite Moments This Year

1. Young Leaders for Peace took their first steps as changemakers.

Our inaugural YLP cohort spent two transformative weeks at the UPEACE campus in Costa Rica, learning what peace looks like in practice and returning home with capstone projects that are already shaping their schools and communities. Their leadership, curiosity, and courage set the tone for the year.

2. Future Peacebuilders expanded globally.

What began as a local internship blossomed into an international fellowship, with students from around the world joining UPEACE NY to learn, lead, and bring youth perspectives into UN spaces. Their contributions to events, research, and partnerships helped position peace education at the center of our programming.

3. Summer Launch 2025.

In July 2025, UPEACE NY brought together more than 50 changemakers for an inspiring summer launch that blended live music, community, and purpose driven giving in support of peace education worldwide. With performances by MorDance and Kira Metcalf, the evening captured what we love most about our community —creativity, connection, and collective action. The event helped advance scholarships for the Young Leaders for Peace program, support workshops rooted in mentorship and intergroup dialogue, and strengthen training opportunities for emerging leaders across education, technology, and the public sector.