The conference is organized every year by committed undergraduates from the University of Notre Dame. The planning process is led by up to three conference leadership fellows, selected through an application process open exclusively to peace studies undergraduates.
Conference fellows come from a variety of different academic programs. Over the course of eight months, they work closely with Kroc Institute staff on all aspects of the conference, from concept to event logistics. You can read more about this year’s leadership team below!
Aria Bossone is a senior from Scottsdale, Arizona, who is majoring in American studies with a supplementary major in peace studies and a minor in gender studies.
Aria’s interests at Notre Dame have largely focused on the intersections of race, gender, American culture, and structural violence. Her work has appeared twice in Through Gendered Lenses, Notre Dame’s annual gender studies journal, one article detailing the experiences of women of color as part of the War on Drugs and the other discussing how spaces of hegemonic masculinity have served as breeding grounds for white nationalist ideology in the United States. Classes such as “Critical Refugee Studies” and “Europe Confronts the Refugees Challenge” have further expanded her research interests to include issues impacting migrant and refugee populations.
Aria has also prioritized experiential learning during her undergraduate career. She spent a summer in Barcelona, Spain, volunteering at a residential shelter for recently-arrived North African and West African refugees, and another summer in Orange, California, working at a shelter for unhoused pregnant women who experienced addiction, neglect, sex trafficking, and domestic abuse. She also studied abroad in Santiago, Chile, spending a semester exploring topics such as the Chilean’s government’s efforts to address systemic poverty and the country’s deep culture of protest and national pride.
Aria is currently working on capstone projects in both of her majors. Her American studies research focuses on the pervasive rhetoric and stigmas in both law and media that targeted Haitian migrants during the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Her peace studies research is an attempt to conceptualize a new framework for analyzing power structures in Palestine/Israel. Using Foucault’s biopower, Haraway’s biotechnopower, and Mbembe’s necropolitics theories as foundational literature, this framework of “necrotechnopower” will explain how Israel’s technological advancements have created a state that dictates how Palestinians live and die.
After graduation, Aria hopes to complete a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship in Spain and then further her peace studies education at Trinity College Dublin with a continued focus on the intersections of gender, structural violence, and immigration.
Evie Garces-Foley is a senior from Annandale, Virginia, studying anthropology, peace studies, and Spanish.
As a Notre Dame undergraduate, Evie’s research interests have focused on the relationships between international NGOs and local communities, looking particularly at trust-building between international conservation organizations and Indigenous populations. These interests are driven by the importance of considering power dynamics and fighting neocolonial frameworks in peacebuilding and conservation efforts.
The daughter of two educators, Evie also has a passion for teaching and sees significant value in making the theories and strategies of peacebuilding accessible to wider audiences outside of the field of peace studies. On campus, she works as a research assistant for Dr. Susan Blum in the Department of Anthropology, collaborating in the School Stories lab and exploring students’ school experiences through storytelling methodologies. She also has a position as God and the Good Life (GGL) Fellow, serving as a dialogue leader for a section of the course and incorporating themes of peace and conflict into philosophical dialogues with first year students.
Evie most recently conducted an independent research project in Peru that developed from her work assisting Dr. Daniel C. Miller with his research on long-term conservation funding success. The project, funded by a Kellogg-Kroc Undergraduate Research Grant, investigated the conditions that foster and hinder trust building between Awajún Indigenous communities and Conservation International. She hopes to use this research toward a peace studies capstone that explores how peacebuilding strategies can foster a more trusting relationship between the diverse stakeholders that care for, and rely on, nature.
After graduation, Evie plans to teach English abroad and then pursue a degree in sustainable peacebuilding, with the goal of working towards a career in environmental peacebuilding with conservation organizations.
Notre Dame students who are interested in conference planning or volunteering at the conference should email the conference leaders at peacecon@nd.edu.
Current students at Notre Dame interested serving in a future leadership position should contact the conference advisor to learn more.