What You'll Learn
Dominican’s MA in Mediation and Conflict Resolution is almost entirely online, allowing you to complete your studies from anywhere while working full-time. We believe that a personal connection—to fellow students and professors—is also important.
That’s one of the reasons our powerful interdisciplinary curriculum begins with a five-day intensive gateway course taught on-campus by experienced professional mediators. You’ll learn—and practice—mediation skills through supervised role-playing and personalized coaching in small groups. From there, you will take online courses exploring the psychological origins of conflict, the ethical dimensions of the discipline, alternative dispute methods, and more. You’ll also choose from engaging electives in subjects such as online dispute resolution, family conflict resolution, and restorative justice. It’s the best of both worlds. Read detailed course descriptions.
You’ll take two courses per semester. Each semester is divided into two intensive eight-week sessions, so you’ll only be taking one course at a time, making it possible to study while keeping up with all the demands of work and family.
A Focus on Ethics
Crucially, Dominican’s mediation and conflict resolution program includes an entire course on ethics. Professional peacemakers are motivated by good intentions, of course, but without proper preparation could wind up inadvertently doing harm. We believe it is important for students to explore the ethical dimensions of conflict resolution from the beginning to guard against such outcomes. This course examines the ethical duties owed to parties in a dispute, with a focus on neutrality, confidentiality and informed consent.