Chapter 1

Introduction
Peace is an idea of a harmonious relationship between people and where
they live in safety and free from violence. It has been an aspiration of our late
ancestors and even the whole world. Complete attainment of it has been a dream
since the ancient times especially in our city where it is very culturally diversified.
Our leaders have been working hard to achieve this dream but still it is not yet
totally present. There have been many attempts to bring peace which consists of
negotiations, peace practices, seminars, inter-religious dialogues and others but
until now there is still confusion and ignorance that brought to conflicts which
resulted to violence.
One of Notre Dame Universitys missions is to foster a culture of peace
and dialogues of faiths and cultures. In order to achieve this mission, Peace must
be first realized within in its community. Graduates of NDU must not only be
academically excellent but also knowledgeable on promoting peace to be truly
globally competitive.

Educating students on different beliefs is vital as it

promotes better understanding on other religions and as future leaders and

citizens of the city it can promote peace that will eventually lead to development.
This study assesses the effectiveness of Notre Dame Universitys Campus
Ministry and Religious Extension activities on promoting peace and development
on accountancy students.

Review of related literature

Peace Education evaluation

According to Harris, Ian M., Peace education refers to formal schoolbased and informal community education programs that teach about the dangers
of violence and alternatives to violence. Difficulties in constructing rigorous follow
up studies with participants in peace education programs make it hard to
determine if graduates of those programs transfer their learning to the real world
and act in ways that contribute to the creation of peaceful cultures. Peace
educators should avoid extravagant claims that their efforts stop violence.
He concluded that: The effectiveness of peace education cannot be
judged by whether it brings peace to the world, but rather by the effect it has on
students thought patterns, attitudes, behaviours, values, and knowledge stock.

Effectiveness of Universal School-Based Programs to Prevent Violent and

Aggressive Behaviour: A Systematic Review
Based on the writing of Robert Hahn, PhD, MPH and his colleagues, He
stated that the anti-violence programs have a consistent effect on all levels.
These programs did not consist of out of classroom activities such as seminars,
but inside classrooms which are part of their classes.

He suggests that there is strong evidence that peace programs have

influences on the occurrence of violence among school children.

Nature, Rationale, and Effectiveness of Education for Coexistence

According to Daniel Bar-Tal, the difference between groups is the hardest
part on achieving harmonious relationships in a society. He said that for peace to
be achieved the society must have a mind-set to recognize other groups as
fellow neighbours and to resolve conflicts in the society in a nonviolent manner.
Education is needed to turn this negative relation into a positive one.

He suggests that when negative relations are based on ethnocentrism,

education for coexistence plays a major role in changing the nature of the
relations. But when negative relations derive from intergroup conflict, education
for coexistence has less influence.

Educating for peace in the midst of violence: a South African experience

A study made by Anne-Marie Maxwell, Penny Enslin and Tudor Maxwell
on South Africa, who suffers an identical conflict on political and social aspects
as to Cotabato city, showed that peace education has a big impact on
discouraging aggressive behaviours to students who are the victims of political
feuds.

Their study concludes that peace education can have considerable

positive impact in a country that is recovering from years of political and social
violence.
Conceptual Framework

Figure 1 Conceptual Framework

Peace And
Developme
nt
Programs
Percieved effects of
Peace And
Development
Programs

This study is based on the idea that Notre Dame University does not only
produce academically competitive graduates but also students who are able to
promote peace within community. It is concerned with the effectiveness of peace
and development programs. Figure 1 represents the graphical conceptual
framework of the study. The 1 st gear represents the intervening variable, which
shows the profile of the respondents in terms of year level, religion and gender.

The 2nd gear represents the Peace and Development programs being conducted
by the CMRE every school year as an activity to further enhance the
peacefulness inside the community as well as instil peace on the students
mentality. The last and biggest gear is the dependent variable which is the
perceived effects of the peace and development programs. The illustration shows
how the three variables work for the completeness of the study.

Statement of the Problem

This study would like to assess the effectiveness of the programs implemented
by the Campus Ministry and Religious Extension of Notre Dame University in line
with the schools mission of promoting peace and development. Specifically, this
study would like to address the following questions:
1. What is the profile of the respondents in terms of course, year level,
religion and sex?
2. What are the programs being conducted by the CMRE and who are its
participants?
3. What did the respondents learn in these programs?
4. What are the perceived effects of the conducted programs?

Significance of the study

The researchers find it important to study the effectiveness of Peace
programs of the Campus Ministry and Religious Extension Office as these

programs will help the students improve understanding among their friends,
classmates and colleagues and as well develop peace within themselves and to
the community. This study will also provide the university insights on how the
students respond to these activities as well as how effective their current
programs are for their participants. This study can also serve a basis for CMRE
for improvements in these programs as well as for the implementation of further
programs to enhance the universitys promotion of peace within its community.
For futures studies, this maybe a guideline for evaluating peace programs and
also how to promote peace through implementing activities.

Scope and Limitation

The researchers limited themselves to the Notre Dame University, College
of Business and Accountancy, Accountancy Department. The respondents are
those who are currently enrolled as either a Bachelor of Science in Accountancy
or Bachelor of Science in accounting technology during the first semester of the
school year 2015-2016 and have at least a one year residency in Notre Dame
University.

Definition of terms:

CMRE. Campus Ministry and Religious extension - An office under the

supervision of the office of the Vice President for Identity and Mission that
administers formative pastoral programs towards spiritual growth, faith
development and formation of the university core values.

Cultural And Religious Diversity refers to the difference among beliefs, race,
traditions and other unique characteristics between groups.

Peace programs there are currently two activities conducted by the Campus
Ministry and Religious Extension that promotes peace and development namely:

Inter-Religious Dialogue - Program for the First year students that

promotes respect for diversities of cultures among the students. This is given on
the second semester every school year.

Peace Orientation Workshop - Aims to foster a culture of peace and

dialogue of faiths and cultures among college students. A whole day activity
which aims to dismiss or minimize misconception, prejudice and discrimination.

Chapter II
Methodology
This chapter contains the methods and procedures used in the study. It
composes of the locale of the study, sampling techniques, data gathering
techniques, data gathering procedure, treatment of data and instruments used to
gather the data.

Research Design
The method used in this study is the descriptive method. This design is
used since it provides specific description and interpretation of source data. It
helps assess the effectiveness of the peace and development programs to
students. This design employs analysis and interpretation to depict the meaning
and outcome of the responses.
Moreover, the researchers used descriptive method in order to fill the data
being gathered, to tests statistically, and to show the errors associated with
results and graphical output.

Locale of the Study

The

Accountancy

Department

of

the

College

of

Business

and

Accountancy, Notre Dame University located at Notre Dame Avenue, Cotabato

City is the centre of the study. Students who are officially enrolled as either
Bachelor of Science in Accounting or Bachelor of Science in Accounting
Technology during the first semester of the school year 2015-2016 who has at
least one year residency in Notre Dame University as these students should
have already attended at least one Peace and Development Programs of the
university are identified for this study.

Respondents of the Study

The respondents of the study are students who are officially enrolled as
either Bachelor of Science in Accounting or Bachelor of Science in Accounting
Technology during the first semester of the school year 2015-2016 who has at
least one year residency in Notre Dame University as these students should
have already attended at least one Peace and Development Programs.

Table 3.1 Total students under the Accountancy Department excluding first year
students.
Course

Population
219

Bachelor of Science in Accountancy

201

Bachelor of Science in Accounting

Technology
Total

420

Table 3.1 presents the total number enrolled under each course offered by
the Accountancy Department of the College of Business and accountancy who
served as the respondents of the study. The population is the total number of
second to fourth year students only. The data were officially gathered from the
registrars office for the first semester of the school year 2015-2016.

Sample Size
Slovins formula had been used in determining the sample size with 10% margin
of error:
Table 3.1 Number of Respondents from Accountancy Department Programs
Course

n=N/1[1+Ne]

Total

Bachelor Of Science in

n=219/[1+219*0.10]

69

n=201/[1+201*0.10]

67

Accountancy
Bachelor of Science in
Accounting Technology
136
Total Respondents

Based on Slovins formula with a 10% margin of error the total

respondents are 136 students with 69 students from the Accountancy Program
and 67 students from the Accounting Technology Program.

Sampling Design
The sampling used in the study was the cluster sampling method. The
sample is clustered into two groups based on their courses: Students from the
Accountancy Program and students from the Accounting Technology Program.
This is done to ensure both courses have proper representation in the study.

Research Instrument
Survey questionnaires were used to gather data from the respondents to
determine the effectiveness of the peace and development programs in Notre
Dame University they have attended. The instrument is divided into two parts:
The first part to distinguish the basic profile of the respondents namely the
course, year level, sex, religion and peace and development programs they have
attended. The second part consists of questions assessing the effectiveness of
peace and development programs on the respondents.

Data Gathering Procedure

The survey questionnaires were presented to respondents from the

Accountancy Department. It is accompanied by a cover letter and the
questionnaire which consists of simple and concise statements in order for the
respondents to grasp the purpose of the study. The survey questionnaires were
returned to the researchers as soon as they were finished for the responses to
be tallied and tabulated.

Measures/Treatment of Data
The study employed the descriptive statistical method as its tool to
interpret the data. This involves the collection, presentation and description of the
numerical data. The tallied and tabulated data will be organized to establish the
frequency count, averages and percentage distribution. Then it will be interpreted
using the descriptive rating scale that will quantify the observations in order to
show the characteristics of the effectiveness of the peace and development
programs in a much more comprehensible manner.

Table 3.3 Rating Scales

Rating
1
2
3
4

Interval
1.00-1.49
1.50-2.49
2.50-3.49
3.50-4.00

Verbal Description
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree

The responses are given a numerical rating to determine its degree of

favourableness and the scores are tallied up to measure the participants over all
response. Likert scale is assumed to be on interval scale which means that the
difference between the ratings has a corresponding value. The tallied ratings will
be used to convert those frequencies into percentage to be able to compare
scores across different respondents.