Leadership | Integrity | Service
The DC Peace Academy launched on May 31, 2022 with its first cohort of community violence intervention workers. The Academy is focused on the personal and professional development of DC’s peacemakers, who serve as frontline workers working in the neighborhoods with the highest rates of violence using the public health approach to reduce shootings and homicides. The curriculum includes 14 weeks of training for frontline workers and is taught by local experts and practitioners. The DC Peace Academy is funded through private donations.
Peacemakers are essential frontline workers who deserve an investment to ensure continuous growth and development as they take on this very important work. In order to build safety and improve outcomes for individuals and neighborhoods, it is critical that these peacemakers receive the additional resources and training on personal and professional development that they need to save the most lives in the shortest amount of time.
For many peacemakers, this is their first job. This advanced training will allow them to excel in their careers. Moreover, they are carrying deep trauma with them from past and ongoing exposure to violence through this job, and they must have additional resources to process their own pain and stress. Peacemaker training programs that have been in existence for many years in other cities have been proven to help “heal the healers” and this program will follow best practices and be independently measured and continuously evaluated.
The DC Peace Academy is investing deeply in frontline workers in order to achieve even greater long-term client outcomes, and reduce shootings & homicides. By strengthening DC’s violence intervention workforce, we enable greater collaboration among the community organizations doing this work.
Addressing DC’s gun violence crisis and supporting grassroots frontline heroes is core to Peace For DC’s mission. Creating safer neighborhoods opens the door to further addressing other systemic disparities.
We have a Police Academy. It’s time we have a Peace Academy. Peacemakers form the backbone of DC’s complimentary system of public health and safety, and it is time to give them the resources they need to succeed in their careers and in their lives. These brave peacemakers will unleash the transformative potential of the community to create systems and strategies that improve outcomes and reduce violence.
We are giving these brave frontline workers all the tools they need to be even more effective in their efforts to reduce shootings and homicide, heal trauma, and build thriving communities.
The effectiveness of DC’s public health approach to reducing violence is largely dependent on the investment we make in the individuals serving as our peacemakers.
Deep gratitude to the co-founding organizations of the DC Peace Academy, who's leadership and vision helped shape the Academy and inspired its very existence.
Sincere appreciation for all of the instructors and partners of the DC Peace Academy who work hand in hand with us every day to pour into DC Peacemakers, ensuring that knowledge is passed down and that Community Violence Intervention operates with Leadership, Integrity, and Service.
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Mayor Muriel Bowser: “The 24 new graduates here join a network of over 300 brave-hearted individuals who are committed to ending gun violence in our communities - Credible Messengers, Violence Interrupters, Roving Leaders, and Outreach Workers- who all work together to save lives."
Anwan “Big G” Glover: “As a true Washingtonian, I truly believe it takes a village to maintain order in our communities. I salute all that step up and don’t turn the other cheek when it comes to our neighborhoods.”
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