Online course “Community Mediation”

Registration for the online course "Community Mediation," organized by the Academic and Learning Department, is open until May 7, 2026.

Duration. The course has a workload of 90 clock hours dedicated to synchronous virtual courses.

Inscription.
Start of course: May 7, 2026

Online mode. The teaching of the course will be developed through the Moodle platform of the Virtual Campus of the UNR.

Destined to: People from the national level and from other Spanish-speaking countries, with a conciliatory profile, interested in training as community mediators to work on the prevention, transformation and resolution of interpersonal, private or public conflicts. Community mediation is especially useful in municipalities and communes, neighborhoods, cultural centers, educational institutions, public or private health, religious institutions, sports, companies, labor offices and also in the daily life of families and social groups.
The graduate may work as a community mediator in public or private centers that deal with community conflicts; serve as a negotiator in resolving disputes or disagreements between different parties. Likewise, each graduate will be able to design and implement projects for the application of appropriate dispute resolution methods in the different areas in which it is socially useful.

For further information : https://www.campusvirtualunr.edu.ar/oferta_academica/cursos/mediacion_comunitaria.html
programcomunidadmediadora@unr.edu.ar

Foundation: With the endorsement of the Universidad Nacional de Rosario, this course offers its attendees a space for participation, transmission and co-construction of knowledge and experiences that will provide them with knowledge, skills and abilities to address social conflicts and the prevention of violence. In this way, an important contribution is made to the community in strengthening social practices aimed at building cultures of peace.
Community mediation constitutes a peaceful and voluntary approach as an alternative to the judicial system of addressing and resolving conflicts, which seeks to improve coexistence within the community. Mediation as a non-adversarial method of conflict management recognizes and promotes the role of the parties involved, who try, by themselves, to reach an agreement that serves as a solution to the conflict with the assistance of a third party (mediator). that provides them with professional help. At the same time, mediation offers a protective – confidential – space for the participants in the conflict situation to talk and reach a mutually satisfactory agreement. The process is guided by a neutral and impartial figure, who, using a range of tools, facilitates dialogue between the parties. This figure does not have decision-making power over the results of the agreement, but rather their decisions are limited to establishing the framework of the mediation process and its conduct. In this sense, the mediator seeks to guarantee effective communication, as well as the equitable and balanced participation of the parties during said process (horizontality).
Community mediation has been positioned as an intervention that produces effects on the social fabric, by recognizing conflicts in the space in which they emerge, along with the interests of the participants. By promoting collaborative dialogue guided by citizens with roots in the community, community mediation has the potential of being close to the subjects immersed in the conflict.
The issues that usually promote controversies are related to community coexistence itself, namely: behaviors that overwhelm social norms or inconveniences in neighborhood relations, such as noise, annoying odors, hygiene and cleanliness habits, the use of common spaces, damages involved in construction works, among others. Community mediation seeks to facilitate both the reciprocal recognition and legitimacy of the parties to the conflict and respects their voluntariness in participation and continuity in the process. Community mediation gives citizens back the power to address and resolve their conflicts through a democratic process that recovers and values ​​their decision-making capacity to determine the best solution to their own conflicts, without a third party vested with authority imposing it.
Based on this academic proposal, the aim is to train citizens with a vocation for service and dialogue as community mediators who can bring tools to address conflicts both in their areas of belonging and professional performance, and who become peace multiplier agents.