Northwestern Opposing War And Racism wants you to “Make Lemonade, Not War.”

Weinberg junior and NOWAR member Laura Dunn passed out free lemonade by The Rock Thursday and talked about the ongoing campaign for a Peace Studies program at Northwestern.

“NU students could really benefit from a background in peace studies and conflict resolution,” said Dunn. “Peace is an interdisciplinary area of study, but it’s very diverse.”

There are currently hundreds of schools in the United States that offer various programs in Peace Studies. But NU doesn’t have one, and NOWAR would like to see that change.

The activists of NOWAR are hoping to get enough signatures on their petition to convince the administration to consider adding Peace Studies as a major or minor in Weinberg.

“We’re trying to get support from the student body so that when we approach the administration, we’ll be able to show interest,” said Caitlin Bruce, a Weinberg freshman.

But Mary Finn, Weinberg assistant dean, said student activism is not enough.

“Any major or minor needs to be proposed by a department or program,” said Finn.

Finn said that NOWAR’s petition could get ASG to pass a recommendation, but only a Weinberg faculty member can propose it.

Other universities with a Peace Studies program said the proposal came from both faculty and students.

Tufts University has had a Peace and Justice Studies program for more than 20 years, but has only offered it as a major for three years, said Dale Bryan, the assistant director of Peace and Justice Studies at Tufts.

“It was student and faculty interest that got the program started,” Bryan said.

Bryan said Peace Studies is a fast-growing field, but interest in the program tends to increase during times of international conflict.

Henry Schwarz, director of Georgetown University’s Program on Peace and Justice, said the program includes classes in culture and politics.

Schwarz said that faculty presented the idea, and program has been around for about 10 years.

“I feel that it has been tremendously successful and well-received,” Schwarz said.

Students at other universities who are peace studies majors said they chose that major for a variety of reasons.

Recent Earlham College graduate Sadie Forsythe said she was interested in Peace Studies because of her religious background.

“I’m a Quaker, which is all about pacifism,” Forsythe said. “It appealed to me because of my religion, but I think that all different types of people can get so much out of Peace Studies.”

At NU, NOWAR is hoping that students will be similarly motivated to pursue Peace Studies.

“Even if you didn’t want to major or minor in Peace Studies, think how cool it would be to take a class or two through the program,” Bruce said.

Mostly, she said, they just want to see Peace Studies as an option at NU so people get another view of activism.

“The traditional view is that violence is inevitable, and we wanted to promote the idea of peace,” Bruce said. “When a lot of people think about peace activism, they think about rallies and protests.”

Dunn agreed that she wants people to see the other side of peace.

“A lot of activism is about being against something,” Dunn said. “We want to be for something.”

Reach Aliza Appelbaum at [email protected].