Beginning of 2013, the Institute of Research and Dialogue for Peace (IRDP) joined other national and international organizations involved in building peace in Rwanda through different educational activities and together they developed the Rwandan Peace Education Program (RPEP).RPEP is a groundbreaking approach to peace education that received financial support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), which started in July 2013 and will end in June 2016. Aegis Trust is the leading partner of the program.

The RPEP primary partners are:

  • Institute of Research and Dialogue for Peace (IRDP); it is a Rwandan non-governmental organization established in 2001. IRDP contributes to the building of a sustainable peace in Rwanda through participatory action research on topics perceived as key challenges for lasting peace. It promotes the culture of critical thinking through debates and dialogues on issues related to peace, the facilitation of debates and dialogue in neutral space, constructive dialogue with authorities and key-players in order to influence policies, and sharing experiences with other peace initiatives.
  •  Aegis Trust; a UK based prevention of genocide charity. Together with Kigali City Council, Aegis established the KGM at the time of the 10th anniversary of the 1994 genocide. KGM exists as a permanent memorial, a place for Rwandans to grieve their losses and as a centre for social cohesion education. Aegis has successfully partnered in Rwanda with the government, international governments and private funders on numerous initiatives.
  •  Radio La Benevolencija (RLB); RLB is a Netherlands based international NGO. It aims at deepening reconciliation and trust in a post-Gacaca Rwanda by using academically researched methodologies to create “knowledge tools” that are presented in media campaigns using entertainment-education to reach audiences that are affected by violence. It broadcasts radio soaps, discussions and educational programmes, in combination with grass roots activities that provide citizens in vulnerable societies with knowledge on how to recognize and resist manipulation to violence and how to heal trauma, encouraging them to be active bystanders against incitement and violence.
  •  USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education, a part of the University of Southern California (USC SF); founded by Steven Spielberg in 1994 to document for future generations the experiences of survivors and other witnesses of the Holocaust before their voices were lost to time. The Institute works within the University of Southern California and with partners around the world to advance academic scholarship and research, to provide resources and online tools for educators, and to disseminate the testimonies for educational purposes. In addition to preserving the testimonies of survivors and other witnesses of the Holocaust in its Visual History Archive, the Institute works with partner organizations to preserve and disseminate audio-visual testimonies of Holocaust survivors and witnesses in digital formats. The potential combination of Holocaust testimony and Rwandan history for peacemaking delivery in Rwanda was explored as part of the partnership with USC SF.