What do you do with a justice and peace studies major or minor?

Anne-Therese Oberstar worked in crisis counseling with Jubilee Jobs. She is currently expanding her capacities by studying Somatic Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco to help people deal with trauma and mental health issues. Michelin Hegland worked several jobs before returning to school to earn an M.A. in Adlerian Psychology and found her own counseling practice, BEvolution, LLC.

Perhaps you would like to teach disadvantaged children in exotic locations like Saipan (Bridget Green) or South Bronx, New York City (Sarah Kirk Lavezzo). Alternatively, you could teach middle-class American kids to understand justice issues, based on your own experience in places like Jamaica (Michelle LeBlanc) or Cuernevaca, Mexico (Michael Johnson). You could also teach social justice in parish settings (Michael Johnson and Therese Cullen). Our graduates have taught or worked at grade schools (Bridget Green and Sarah Kirk Lavezzo), high schools (Michael Johnson), and colleges (Michelle LeVoy and Heidi Tousignant).

As noted under education, parishes often look for staff to teach social justice (Michael Johnson and Therese Cullen), sometimes in conjunction with youth ministry (Heidi Tousignant).

You could apply your justice and peace vision to a commercial job in business. Steve Bauer works with Paragon Coffee in New York as a wholesale coffee buyer and seller, specializing in fair trade coffee. He recently began investing in a biodiesel company in the state of Washington that produces motor fuel from algae that grow on sewage. After her United Nations experience (see below) and jobs with PriceWaterhouseCoopers and General Electric, Tomoko Sayama now works for an Australian recruiting firm seeking cross-cultural, bilingual candidates from universities and graduate schools in Japan and abroad to work for foreign investors in Japan and China.

After some experience, you might want to start your own business. With a partner, Steve Bauer opened three social-justice oriented coffee shops in Colorado. After experience with Minnesota Mining (3M), Linda Michel founded "Michel by Design" specializing in communications strategies. With only one course from our program, but married to one of our majors, Aaron Franklin put his experience at Goldman Sachs, Rockwood, and The Real Deal to work founding Capital Intelligence Solutions–a research firm for commercial real estate sales. Another graduate is co-owner of a publishing company editing books dealing with social justice.

After studies for a Masters’ Degree designed for United Nations workers, Tomoko Sayama, worked for the UN in Bosnia-Herzegovina, advancing to become head of the United Nations Volunteers Programme Bosnia and Herzegovina. Inspired by her student experiences with the poor in Haiti, Tamara Thompson worked there after graduation as an election observer for the Organization of American States. Many of our graduates have served in the Peace Corps or in Americorps.

Therese Cullen learned non-violent advocacy personally from Arun Gandhi, grandson of the Mahatma, taught it in a Catholic parish, and practiced it at a Catholic Worker house she helped found in Memphis, Tennessee.

Agriculture and the Environment

As Ranch Manager at B Bar Ranch in Yellowstone country, Mark Waite has promoted endangered livestock breeds, hosted environmental groups, and lobbied to keep the Yellowstone grizzley on the endangered species list and to get a large area on the edge of Yellowstone Park designated as a Wilderness and Wildlife Conservation Area. Other graduates have worked with the Minnesota Farmers’ Union and the Mississippi Market Co-op.