General Course Information

Course: PACS 2500: Introduction to Peace and Conflict Studies

Instructor: Guy Burgess

Main Campus Office: Hellems 5 (Down the stairs by the southwest door of Hellems.) 

Main Campus Office Hours: Monday-Wednesday 4:20 - 4:50; Tuesday and Thursday – 2:50 - 3:20. Other times by appointment.  I'm available, feel free to call. You can use this as an informal time to stop by and chat. Don't feel like you have to have something official to talk about..

Main Campus Office Phone: 303-492-6654

East Campus Office: ARC building, 3100 Marine St, East campus, Room A228 [2nd floor (excluding basement), south "Annex" wing, (not room 228)] -- Take the Stampede bus.

East Campus Office Hours: Most mornings. Call first to make sure I'm available!

East Campus Office Phone: 303-492-1635

Class Periods / Classrooms: Section 1: Tuesda /Thursday 3:30 PM - 4:45 PM    CLRE 209; Section 2: Monday/Wednesday   5:00 PM - 6:15 PM    CLRE 104 

Web Site: http://conflict.colorado.edu/pacs4500-s09/ 

Class E-mail: Updates about the class will be sent out to your official University e-mail address. You are responsible for routinely monitoring mail to this address.

Assignment Submission:  It is very important that you do all of these things. Otherwise, I am likely to lose your assignment!

• Send all assignments to crc@colorado.edu.  
• Include PACS4500 and the assignment name in the subject line.   
• Put your name, class, and assignment in every attachment and in the filename of your attachment!  
• Leave the extensions on your filename (These are the letters that follow the period at the end of the filename .doc .docx, etc.). 
• Keep backup copies of all assignments submitted. If your assignment is lost I will ask you to resend your original e-mail.  The time stamps on the e-mails will be used to determine whether or not assignments were submitted on time.
• Save and submit all assignment in a standardized format. Use either Microsoft Word (.doc); Rich Text Format (.rtf); or Adobe Portable Datafile (.pdf).

Back-Ups: You are responsible for making backups of all of your work. This is easy to do. Use flash drives or e-mail yourself copies of draft and final assignments. This will protect you in case something terrible happens to your computer.  Every semester I have several students who run into serious trouble because of computer failure. Don't be one of them. Protect yourself.)

Quick Response E-mail: For urgent questions, use my personal e-mail: guy.burgess@colorado.edu <NOTE CHANGE and write "PACS4500 Urgent" in the subject line. I check this constantly. You can also call me at my office phone, 303-492-1635; or, if necessary, my home phone, 303-499-0354. During office hours (3:15-5:00 Tuesday/Thrusday) you can call me at my main campus office303-492-6654. (For example, you should use a phone call or the quick response e-mail to report any problems with the website.)

Texts: All readings for the class will be drawn from two major online knowledge-base systems based at the University of Colorado Conflict Information Consortium. These include CRInfo, the Conflict Resolution Information Source (www.CRInfo.org) and Beyond Intractability, the web site of the Intractable Conflict Knowledge Base Project (www.beyondintractability.org) as well as other Web accessible sources. Readings will include summaries of some of the key books in the peace and conflict resolution fields as well as comprehensive articles describing key conflict dynamics and intervention strategies. Also included are interviews, with professional peace builders, inspirational stories and case studies, and relevant news articles.  These systems, which are described more detail in the Consortium's online brochure,  provide easy and comprehensive and assess to the field's insights.

Textbook Cost: To defray the considerable cost of operating the Conflict Information Consortium systems to be used as the class textbook, I am asking everyone to donate $25 to Beyond Intractability's account with the University of Colorado Foundation. This donation can be made by credit card at our section of the University of Colorado Foundation website. Please do this within the first three weeks of class.

Assignments: Specific, day-to-day assignments posted on the Detailed and Continually Updated Course Schedule. The Course Schedule page contains the official assignments for the course. It will be updated as the course proceeds (in order to focus on current events and areas of more intense student interest). This schedule page will include links to readings as well as class discussion PowerPoints. Since plans for the course may vary significantly, you should talk to me before working ahead.

To Be Added Class Pictures: Please click here to view the pictures and make sure that I have the names right.

Peace and Conflict Studies
Guy Burgess -- burgess@colorado.edu -- 303-492-1635