Alexia Georgakopoulos, Ph.D., is a Professor in the esteemed Department of Conflict Resolution Studies (DCRS) at Nova Southeastern University (NSU), which is one of the earliest pioneer programs in conflict resolution that was established over 30 years ago. She has been an educator and visionary in this program for over 20 years and is proud to be part of one of the largest leading conflict studies programs in the nation and around the globe that has trained thousands of students who have become leaders in the field across a variety of settings. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate students. She is also the Director of the Institute of Conflict Resolution and Communication, a premier mediation and conflict resolution training and consulting firm specializing in delivering conflict resolution educational training and Florida Supreme Court Mediation Certification to professionals. She is a board member of the Association of Conflict Resolution- Florida Chapter where she designs conflict resolution programming for communities and universities. She is editor of The Mediation Handbook: Theory, Research and Practice published by Routledge. She has intentionally pursued the path of peace and conflict studies to promote a Culture of Peace because of the violence and war that has impacted her family over the generations. Her great grandmother witnessed Nazis’ burn down her entire village and home in Epirus, Greece, her immigrant Greek grandfather served  three years in the U.S. Airforce during World War II, and she and her family experienced the violence of a revolution in the Middle East when one of her parents worked and was stationed there by the U.S. Department of Defense. As a professor, trainer, researcher, practitioner, and world-class expert in conflict transformation, peace, and mediation with two decades of work in the field, she is a nationally and internationally sought out speaker. She was interviewed and appeared on NBC’s Today Show to discuss peace in a diverse world.

Dr. Georgakopoulos conducts notable conflict transformation and peacebuilding work both internationally and domestically. She has joined the former President of Mediator Beyond Border, Lynn Cole along with a leading team of U.S. and international peacebuilders including professors from Colombia University and Nova Southeastern University to deliver Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding training to faculty and students in Ukraine at Kyiv University and the University of Hryhorii Skovoroda University. This pioneer program is being rolled out to graduate students across Ukraine, and it is also being offered to Ukrainian Military Veterans. The mission of this Peace Ambassador Project is to develop peacebuilders in Ukraine with the training that involves conflict transformation, peacebuilding, mediation, nonviolent communication, trauma-informed conflict resolution, and other dispute resolution approaches to support after war recovery, conflict transformation, and sustainable peace for the future of Ukraine. This is a model peace program that has been developed to support peace in countries that face the atrocities of violence and war. Another significant international project that Dr. Georgakopoulos was involved with included being on the expert taskforce of seven international peacebuilders who served as part of the Middle East Initiative Group of the Mediators Beyond Borders to design and review mediation/peace curriculum with leading Israeli and Palestinian peacebuilders. This peace curriculum has been used by peacebuilders in Israel and Palestine for over a decade and has the potential to promote change toward more constructive conflict approaches in the region.

Dr. Georgakopoulos has trained thousands of students to become leading conflict resolution professionals throughout the world in classroom and training contexts in her role as a professor in this pioneer conflict resolution program at NSU. Many successful alumni from this program with whom she continues to collaborate with are valuable networks for her current students (check out the alumni spotlights on our website). She regularly teaches Mediation, Facilitation, Negotiation, Conflict Management Systems, Culture and Conflict, Human Factors, Internship, and the Conflict Resolution Start-Up. She has designed and teaches a popular course that helps students start and launch their own businesses titled Entrepreneurship and Starting your Dispute Resolution Business where she coaches students to move from their ideas to launch their own businesses. Fondly known as Dr. G by her students, she is truly dedicated to being a student-centered professor and intentionally fosters a learning environment that is engaging and inspiring. She provides mentorship and shadowing opportunities for her students because she is practicing in real world settings as a mediator (in diverse forms of mediation such as family, corporate, environmental, and multinational mediation), facilitator, arbitrator, dispute systems designer, conflict coach, and peacebuilder. She has worked as a facilitator with a House Representative who was charged by the White House to address policy issues concerning National Security. She received a Quality-of-Life Grant to design a community program for peace, which included the Youth Peace Leadership Mentorship Programs for reputable organizations. She has numerous projects past and present, but the most important elements of her work with students are to teach them to make an impact and to prepare them for inspiring career pathways.

In the area of scholarship and research, Dr. Georgakopoulos is a well-recognized scholar and author who considers quality research to be research that can be translated into practice. She has an active research program and specializes in Mediation, Conflict Management Systems, Entrepreneurship in Conflict Resolution, Adult Workplace Bullying and Workplace Wellness/Safety, and along with her research in these areas, she engages in praxis by regularly delivering training on these topics. She is the Editor of the Handbook of Mediation: Theory, Research, and Practice published by Routledge. The handbook features nearly 60 thought leaders, forefront authorities, and notable practitioners in the fields of mediation, peace studies, justice, human rights, and conflict resolution. Many contributors are pioneers in the field such as Kenneth Cloke. This work is a unique multidisciplinary collaboration that Dr. Georgakopoulos organized with participating scholars and practitioners from various universities, centers, and organizations that included, but was not limited to the following: John Hopkins University, Georgetown University, Harvard, Mediators Beyond Border, U.S. and the Military Academy to name a few. The text is informed by cogent theory, state-of-the-art research, and best practices to provide the reader with a well-rounded understanding of mediation practice across settings (relational, community, organizational, environmental, and international contexts) in contemporary times. More about the book can be found at bit.ly/TheHandbookofMediation. She was featured among the leading experts on workplace bullying at the Annual Conference on Workplace Bullying and Harassment where she was a co-panelist with Dr. Gary Namie who is an authority on the topic. See scholarly works to see more examples of her research.

She is committed to providing service in the community and as such she is the Director of the Conflict Resolution Community of Practice Working Group, which is a Department of Conflict Studies’ Working Group devoted to a movement for Positive CHANGE in Communities. She welcomes anyone with a passion to promote change in communities to join. Further details of past and present programs are provided on the website.

She is committed to offering quality educational programs to her students.