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Youth Conflict Specialists

Meet The Team

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Tricia S. Jones is a Professor in the Department of Communication and Social Influence and Director of the Center for Conflict Management and Media Impact in the Klein College of Media and Communication at Temple University. She is a past Faculty Senate President, Vice-President and Secretary at Temple. She is past Vice- President and Member of the Board of Directors of the National Association for Conflict Management, past President of the International Association of Conflict Management, and a Curriculum Design Consultant for the American Bar Association Section on Dispute Resolution. Her work in conflict management spans 35 years of teaching, research and practice in conflict resolution intervention, conflict resolution education, alternative dispute resolution, intercultural conflict, and organizational dispute system design.

She has received over $6 million in external funding from federal and state agencies and private foundations including a recent 2022-2025 Department of Justice grant for $1.7 million to teach conflict education to systems-involved middle and high-school youth for youth empowerment and violence prevention. She has authored 8 books, 80+ articles and book chapters and has given more than 300 presentations at national and international conferences. Her recent book, Intercultural Communication: A Peace- building Perspective (2023) was used by UNESCO as a Foundation for a global six-part symposia series in fall 2023 on Intercultural Competencies and Peace-building. She is currently writing Media and Social Conflict (Rowman Littlefield, in process) and The Heart of Conflict: Emotion Theory and Impact in Conflict Processes (Sage, in process).

Her conflict consulting work has focused on training, intervention, and research programs for government agencies, higher education, health care and state offices of dispute resolution. She works with federal agencies including Department of Defense, Department of State, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Emergency Management Association, National Institutes of Health, Department of Justice, Department of Education, United States Air Force, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Federal Bureau of Printing and Engraving, National Mediation Board, Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, Department of the Interior, National Archives and Consumer Finance Protection Bureau.

She has the honor of serving as a senior consultant working in dispute system design for the United Nations’ Ombuds and Mediation Services
and for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Ombuds and Mediation Service. She has recently been invited by the World Bank to
work with their global ADR offices.

Since 2013, Dr. Jones has worked with the New York State Unified Court Systems Community Dispute Resolution Centers (CDRCs) infusing conflict
Interventions into the 62-county CDRC network overseen by NYUCS Office of Court Administration; this has helped develop conflict interventions in criminal court diversion programs, community disputes, youth-based programs, special education disputes, and family conflicts. Similarly, she has partnered with the Massachusetts Office of Public Collaboration and the Maryland Office of Dispute Resolution (MACRO) to build capacity in their statewide systems.
In 2023 she was invited to support a 5-year project infusing conflict coaching as a special education dispute resolution process in the California SELPAs – regional associations to support families and individuals dealing with special education dispute processes and systems. California has over 1/8th of the school children and more special education disputes than any state in the U.S. The proposed system re-design is researching the efficacy of early intervention processes to reduce the personal, family and economic costs of special education dispute escalation.

Dr. Jones is the Project Director of the Conflict Resolution Education in Teacher Education (CRETE) project funded for $2.8 million by the U.S. Department of Education’s FIPSE program (Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education), Gund Foundation, JAMS Foundation, and others. Dr. Jones served as a member of the Peace Education Reference Group for the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC) and co-chaired the Peace Education and Conflict Resolution Education work group of the United Nations conference at the UN Headquarters in New York for1,000+ government and NGO representatives from 60+ countries (2005). Dr. Jones was a member of the facilitation team for International Summits on Conflict Resolution Education that were hosted by national and international partners including the Organization of American States and the United Nations Development Program 2004-2010. In 1995-1997 she led a team of U.S. and South African educators in a United States Information Agency funded project building Community Peace and Safety networks in Johannesburg, South Africa following the initiation of the Mandela government and the end of apartheid.

Tricia S Jones
Project Director

Kelly Boyle
Mentor Student

Monica Hankins Padilla
Lead Trainer

Johnkier Pedraza
Mentor Student

Dr. Trisha Swed
Lead Trainer

Dante Harrell
Mentor Student

Carissa George
Training Intern

Elizabeth McKenzie
Lead Trainer

Sanai Clark
Mentor Student

Gianna Barile
Training Intern

We are passionate about the work we do!

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