On Nov 26 students from the school ‘EMEF Prof. Maria de Lourdes’, in Corumbataí, in Brazil, held an event on Culture for Peace. For that day they received a visit from Dr Ivana Ribeiro and Upeace alumni Marcos Estrada. Both of them are members of the Brazilian Institute of Education for life (IBEV). Dr Ribeiro and Estrada were also invited to participate in the “1st Walk for Peace” that aimed to engage people to cultivate Culture of Peace. The walk for peace was an outcome of the elaboration of the “Good News Newspaper”, which is based on the Earth Charter principles. To this newspaper students can only write good news that they would like to read. 
In his presentation Marcos Estrada talked about the Earth Charter principles and news. After this, Dr. Ribeiro conducted an exercise on choosing news and connecting them with a reality. There were local, regional and national news available but students chose mainly news from their home town, Corumbataí and justified this by saying that peace must start from their hometown.
Everyone was invited to join the march through the city to promote peace and the Earth Charter. At the end, the march led back to the school where the students were interviewed by EPTV. EPTV is a part of Rede Globo, the biggest Brazilian TV Channel. The event was broadcasted in the afternoon news, just couple of hours after the end of the march.
One of the students, Luelen Janice, was asked about the importance of a culture of peace. To this Janice answered flowingly: “Peace if fundamental for us, without peace on earth we are worthless”.
Article by Marcos R. Estrada de Oliveira
Photos by Ivana Ribeiro
