The American Educational Research Association (AERA) held its annual meeting April 13-16, 2023, in Chicago. Included among the six Division B (Curriculum Studies) preconference seminars was “Peace, Justice, and Creative Coexistence as Curriculum.” The six-hour seminar, centered on Daisaku Ikeda’s 40 annual peace proposals (1983-2022), was facilitated by AERA Vice President Isabel Nuñez (Purdue University Fort Wayne) and Jason Goulah, professor and director of the DePaul University Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education. Pre-registered participants included 12 scholars and doctoral students from diverse backgrounds, disciplines, and institutions in the United States and Canada. After sharing self-introductions and research interests, participants explored themes from the Ikeda corpus, including creativity, peace, justice, and research and curriculum animated by value creation of aesthetic beauty, personal gain, and social good.  

Preconference discussion

Preconference facilitators and participants

Other meeting presentations by DePaul faculty and alumni in Ikeda/Soka Studies included:

  • Daisaku Ikeda and African American Pragmatism: Race, Identity, and Cosmopolitan Becoming in the Dewey-Soka Heritage 
    Jason Goulah, DePaul University
  • Truth and Value in Makiguchi Tsunesaburō’s Value-Creating Pedagogy: A New Current in Curriculum Studies 
    Jason Goulah, DePaul University
  • Value Creation and Happiness in Education: Daisaku Ikeda and Asia as Method 
    Jason Goulah, DePaul University
  • John Dewey and Tsunesaburo Makiguchi: Conceptions of Truth for Times of Change
    Gonzalo Obelleiro, DePaul University
  • Value-Creating Leadership: A Thematic Analysis
    Michael B. Cornell, Teachers College, Columbia University
    Melissa Riley Bradford, DePaul University
    Julie Nagashima, North Central College
  • Cultivating Novice Researchers as Value Creators: A Self-Study in Teaching Doctoral Research Methods Courses
    Thomas Noel, DePaul University
    Melissa Riley Bradford, DePaul University
  • Cultivating Wisdom, Compassion, and Courage of General Education Preservice Teachers for Equitable and Holistic Education
    Nozomi Inukai, DePaul University
  • Expanded Consciousness: Value Creation Through Arts-Based Dialogue
    Amy Weatherford, DePaul University

Institute director Jason Goulah presenting

Institute director Jason Goulah presenting

Institute affiliated faculty, Nozomi Inukai presenting