Identifying conflict areas, working to prevent them and stopping them are skills needed within families and in businesses alike, she said. “Everything is linked,” said Aminata Sidibe, in charge of the school. Among courses taught are entrepreneurship, communications, computer science and social mediation. The hope is to have 200 students by the end of the year. The learning center, located above an outlet of PNB-Paribas bank, which lent Whitaker a huge hand in his discovery of Aubervilliers, actually began offering its free classes in late April and currently has more than 70 students. Returning to the here and now, he added that “sometimes we have to address peace that way, to work as a team on the ground … we have to know that we can make a difference ourselves.” In the end, “I knew that the only way to really find peace was to work together as a society and to work together on the ground.” “I started trying to figure out how to fix that,” he said. All eyes were glued on his large, quiet presence. “I would see in some of their eyes this look … a look that I knew from when I remember gang members from my neighborhood” in Los Angeles, he said to a crowd of local officials and enthusiastic members of his French NGO. His presence in Aubervilliers forms part of an arc that included his work with child soldiers in Uganda, where his NGO is present. It is the Academy Award winner’s first foray into Europe, and the ninth country where his nongovernmental organization operates, all light years from the lights of Hollywood and the accolades and awards bestowed on him for his film career. Free classes are being offered in a small space with big ideas in Aubervilliers, outside Paris. Whitaker officially inaugurated on Wednesday his Whitaker Peace and Development Initiative in Seine-Saint-Denis, meant to bring business, communication and conflict resolution skills to the young people of France’s poorest region. AUBERVILLIERS, France (AP) - Renowned actor Forest Whitaker, who has portrayed a dictator, a Mafia hitman and a butler, has taken on what for some may be his most inspirational role.
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