In June, P.E.A.C.E. members met in person and via Zoom at the Mercy Center in Auburn, CA, for our annual retreat. Again, we had a full agenda to cover, including discussions about our newsletter, members, social media, P.E.A.C.E. Projects, conference proposals, and our quarterly Book Club meetings. We also discussed in the potential Peace Award recipients for the year 2026, which will be released next year!
We had ongoing meetings regarding the structure and future of our organization. We were excited to welcome two new members to our retreat this year, Aubrey Budelli and Monica Moran. Monica is the chair of our Book Club, and Aubrey is the new committee chair for our P.E.A.C.E. Projects. She will follow in Lucy Stroock’s footsteps and receive ongoing support from Pat Dorman. We would like to thank Lucy for all her efforts in supporting the P.E.A.C.E. Projects over the past several years!
This year, we had the P.E.A.C.E. Project recipients share their projects during our Zoom meeting on Tuesday, and they each provided a fine narrative regarding the peace work they had accomplished. We will publish each project in our newsletters starting this month. Please consider becoming a project leader or sponsor for the next round of awards coming this fall!
We also conducted our book club meeting which we added a review below. The topic was on Social Stories, and many were shared. Dr. Shu-Chen Jenny Yen joined us from Taiwan and she shared her latest Social Story on Deportation and ICE, which is published in this edition below. At night, we shared some of our favorite children’s books and collaborated on developing a handout called “Peaceful Practices”, which will be made available during our next fundraiser in September.
Next year’s retreat will be in Auburn at the Mercy Center, July 27th through the 30th. We hope to see you there!
