PeaceQuest Centre for Human Excellence

  Faith-based Approach to Hate and Violence Prevention Abid Ullah Jan In the 1990s, youth violence connected to gangs and drug-related crimes was escalating to unprecedented levels in many neighbourhoods within the city of Boston. A record of 152 homicides and 1,000 aggravated assaults were reported in 1990. Religious organisations formed a coalition called TenPoint and changed the situation dramatically. The number of homicides in Boston dropped dramatically from a high of 152 in 1990 to 31 in 1999. Between August 1995 and January 1998, Boston had not one teenage homicide victim. Homicides during the 1990s declined by 80 percent. Further, complaints against police dropped by over 60 percent during the same period. Two and a half years with no teenage homicides looked very much like a miracle to most reasonable observers. The dramatic results that followed received national attention, and Rev. Rivers, one of the visible leaders of the  TenPoint Coalition , would find himself o...

  Published on November 26, 2018 by   Abid Ullah Jan Save   Abid Ullah Jan “We” first approach is the key ingredient for the success of the evolving collective Impact work for P/CVE in Ottawa. In the wake of rising extremism and hate crimes, the Chief of Ottawa Police, the Mayor’s office, Yasir Naqvi – the then MPP – and the chair of OLIP Network approached United Way Ottawa in February 2017 for a mechanism: 1) to respond to groups and organizations in the community who are active in preventing hate crime through diversity, inclusion and integration of services perspective, 2) to find ways to support and champion that work, 3) to engage those who not currently involved, 4) to engage passive supporters who need information and opportunity and 5) to identify disenfranchised and vulnerable groups who stand in opposition to efforts at diversity and inclusion. United Way has since taken a lead on convening and engaging the right partners. We have made considerable progress. We...

  A Note to TST and CVE Training Designers and Facilitators Abid Ullah Jan Content from PeaceQuest could be used for Muslim Youth Resilience projects to avoid a disproportionate number of them ending up in the criminal justice system. The themes that PeaceQuest has picked up and the relevant research that has been done will be helpful in building knowledge and capacity to develop the right training/workshop material for children as well as youth which might be at risk of criminal involvement. Adding the faith factor to the evidence-based Trauma Systems Therapy (TST) sessions for at-risk youth to address anti-social behaviour and preventing criminal inclement is necessary. The content on PeaceQeust shows which theme and what specific info needs to be incorporated for a deeper impact. Adding these Islamic concepts to the TST and other resilience-building programs add inspiration, hope and motivation to act moderately; to improve sense of safety, permanency, and wellbeing among the vu...

  Protecting youth through the most powerful motivating and behaviour shaping concepts Abid Ullah Jan The most disappointing moments are the ones when we hear the news about homicide and gun violence and find out that both the perpetrators and victims are Muslim youth. Or when we visit Ottawa police service and almost all wanted people are Muslims. These facts become even more disappointing when we come to know from  credible research  that religion and parental involvement plays a key role in shaping positive conduct of youth exposed to violence and crime. Other studies  have concluded that religion is a key protective factor in the severity of crimes committed by juveniles with sexually offending behaviour. There is no denying the fact that faith factor does reduce deviance and cut crimes. However, no research has systematically investigated the positive impact of Islamic concepts on children and youth. Anyone who understands the basics of Islam can tell that Islam...

  The forgotten factor In Preventing Hate, Crime and Violence Abid Ullah Jan One of the interesting questions is: how do we know that nurturing our spiritual self is key to staying away from hate, crime and extremist tendencies? To answer this question, we need to look into credible academic research first to see the impact of mere involvement with religion on crime in general, and then deduct how profound the impact will be will be when a systematic approach is adopted to inspiring spiritualism and putting individuals on the right path to achieving human excellence. Richard Freeman 1  at Harvard University conducted a study in 1986 which was particularly helpful in turning our attention to religion as a factor helping at-risk youth become resilient youth — youth who stay out of trouble despite living in the neighbourhoods where crime occurs all around them and even though there was no specific content or delivered to those you. Freeman found that mere frequent church attendan...

Sharing four facts to unravel the myth (the Quran Promotes Violence) that sustains the fear and hatred of Muslims and Islam. Intro : Fact 1: The Quran demands complete reading : Fact 2: All interpretations need to be discouraged : Fact 3: The right to self-defence can't be twisted for extremism : Fact 4: "Them" are not non-Muslims : Translation by: Alaa adel nasr https://www.facebook.com/alaa.adel.25... Also see: Islamophobia and Anti-Semitism https://youtu.be/p-F5dfcGEes Does Islam inspire hatred? https://youtu.be/p-F5dfcGEes. https://peacequest.net

The Essence of Our Common Humanity How did we get here? What makes us do this? And how are we letting this happen without much resistance? The recent attacks on religious institutions, people of other faiths are showing us that we are falling back on ourselves, hoping things would miraculously improve, instead of us trying to tackle this big challenge collectively. […] Watch Video PeaceQuest CommDev About the Author: Abid Ullah Jan Abid Ullah Jan’s Awards Abid Ullah jan’s Books Abid Ullah Jan’s Manuals Abid Ullah Jan Videos Crime Prevention through Social Development (French) by Abid Ullah Jan Implementing Crime Prevention through Social Development by Abid Ullah Jan Highlighting Success Stories – Abid Ullah Jan When Neighbourhoods Bounce Back – Abid Ullah Jan Crime Prevention Outcome - Abid Ullah Jan Crime Prevention through Social Development - Abid Ullah Jan Crime Prevention Ottawa – Safety Community Guide - Abid Ullah Jan...