David J. Smith

David J. Smith is the Institute's national educational outreach officer. He coordinates Institute-wide educational outreach and public programming efforts. Smith works closely with educational and professional associations, academic institutions, and public groups to promote Institute objectives. He speaks frequently to community, faculty and student groups on a variety of issues including civil society and peacebuilding, child soldiers, conflict resolution education and international education.

Before joining the Institute in 2005, his work focused on teaching at the college and university level. As a Fulbright scholar, Smith taught peace studies and alternative dispute resolution at the University of Tartu in Tartu, Estonia. He has also taught at the undergraduate level at Harford Community College,  Goucher College, Towson University, and Stevenson University, and at the graduate level at George Mason University. At USIP, he has traveled widely around the U.S. consulting with colleges and universities on approaches to teaching peace. He has also worked in the fields of domestic and community conflict resolution, and as a practicing attorney.  He has lectured on American mediator practice at Uppsala University in Sweden and the University of Jammu in India. Smith currently serves on the Rockville, Maryland Human Rights Commission and has published in the International Herald Tribune, Baltimore Sun, and Chronicle of Higher Education.

Smith holds a B.A. in political science and urban affairs from the American University School of Public Affairs, an M.S. from the George Mason University Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, and a J.D. from the University of Baltimore School of Law.

Publications:

• "Starting a Career Building Peace," , Career Convergence MagazineThe National Career Development Association (February 2011)
• "Lessons in Leadership: Peace Keepers, Colleges as teachers of peace and conflict resolution,” Community College Journal (August/September 2010)
• “International Conflict Resolution and the Domestic Practitioner,” Resolving Issues (November 2009)
• "Global peace, conflict and security: approaches taken by American community colleges," Journal of Peace Education, Vol. 5, Issue 1, pgs 63-78 (March 2008).
• "How Community Colleges Can Work for World Peace," The Chronicle of Higher Education (October 2007).
• "A Map of Peace and Conflict Studies in U.S. Undergraduate Colleges and Universities," Conflict Resolution Quarterly vol. 25, no. 1 (Fall 2007).
• Peace and Conflict Resolution Programs at the Undergraduate Level: Fostering the Next Generation of Peacemakers (ACResolution, Spring 2007).
• "Teaching Conflict Resolution in Estonia," ACResolution (Winter 2005).
• "Teaching Gandhi in Estonia," Online Journal of Peace and Conflict Resolution (2003).
• "New Europe, Old Europe," The Baltic Times (November 2003).
• "Goodbye Russia, Hello Europe," The International Herald Tribune (October 2003).
• "The Community College in Peace and War," Conflict Management in Higher Education Report (February 2003).

Presentations:

• "Peace Studies Approaches in Undergraduate Education in the U.S.," Virginia Tech Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention, October 23, 2008.