Terry Halifax
Northern News Services

Inuvik (May 24/02) - Whether dealing with a bratty brother or a schoolyard bully, dealing with conflict is all part of growing up.

Last week, 21 Samuel Hearne secondary school students took part in a three-day seminar on how to deal with conflicts

Pamela Louie is the head of training for YouCan! Canada -- a non-profit organization run by youth for youth.

The organization offers youth aged 12 to 24 a course on how conflicts arise and methods for dealing with them in a rational way.

The students were trained to be peer mediators who will work as a neutral go-between in an argument, but won't offer solutions.

"They try to ask them questions to get the disputants to come up with their own solutions," Louie said.

The program offers role-playing games where students work through a scenario and effectively learn through play.

"Our method of teaching is to play a lot of games and they enjoy the games, so it really holds their attention," she said.

Every 18 months the group holds an international conference, where 600 youth from all over the world come to take part in the program. Louie says the attitudes and interests of kids are the same everywhere, but the issues change with geography.

"Here, the issue seems to be that everyone here knows everyone else, so rumours fly, whereas, in Toronto you could move schools and no one would know them," she said. "We trained some kids from Columbia and their issues were about war -- guns and land mines and armies and it was really shocking to hear."

Youth justice committee co-ordinator, John Nash, said the program was a spin-off from a Toronto conference attended by Inuvik's Youth Justice Committee, which mandated the establishment of a peer mediation group at Samuel Hearne.

"It will give them skills and strategies to resolve conflicts whether it be with their friends or at home or with themselves," Nash said.

Each student will receive a certificate of completion from YouCAN! Canada. Nash says the course will help the students out at school and home.

"It's a good experience for these kids to try to help resolve conflicts in their everyday lives; be it between student and student or teacher and student," Nash said.

Following the seminar, Grade 7 student Leah Sulyma said she learned a lot about resolving arguments.

"You sit the two people down and you ask them questions and help them interact to find their own solution," Sulyma said.

"You have ground rules to prevent them from arguing back and forth."

Her classmate Alyssa Carpenter said she'll get some practical use from the program at home.

"I could help my brothers with it, because they always fight," Carpenter said. "That's why my mom wanted me to take it -- to help my brothers."