Speakers tackled social justice issues this weekend ranging from affirmative action to rehabilitating prisoners at the third annual Social Justice Teach-In, sponsored by Marquette's Jesuit University Students Together in Concerned Empowerment, or JUSTICE.

JUSTICE member Alison Griffith, a College of Arts & Sciences junior, said the teach-in was intended "to educate people in Milwaukee about social justice topics" and to encourage those people to work for change.

An estimated 80 students, faculty and members of the Marquette community attended the series of lectures on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, according to Griffith.

Amnesty International helped arrange the teach-in, she said.

Speakers included Ryan Kulik, program director of the Wisconsin Anti-Violence Effort, who discussed gun violence; George Martin, the director of Peace Action Wisconsin, who discussed the war in Iraq; and Marquette Theology Professor Dan Maguire, who discussed affirmative action and ending what he called "white male monopolies."

For most of its history, the United States "gave 95 to 100 percent of all the best jobs and positions in church, state, business and the professions to white males," Maguire said.

In 1980, Maguire wrote "A New American Justice: Ending the White Male Monopolies" and has since written several articles on the topic.

"Preferential affirmative action is the way of breaking up that unfair white male quota system," he said.

Zachary Johnson, a representative of the Vipassana Project, an organization that runs a program in correctional facilities that employs Vipassana Buddhist meditation as a way to help prisoners deal with issues of anger and addiction, also spoke at the teach-in.

The program first began in India in 1992 and has spread rapidly since then, Johnson said, making its debut in the United States in Seattle in 1997.

Studies have shown prisoners who complete the 10-day programs are a third less likely to repeat their offenses than the average prisoner, and are unlikely to use drugs and alcohol after their release, he said.

Johnson said urban violence "is a public health problem," and Vipassana techniques help prisoners control the anger that often leads to violence.

He said the volunteers who run the program — often graduates of the program themselves — do so "because they think it's something that can bring real change into our communities."

Corey Swearngin, a College of Arts & Sciences freshman, said he attended Maguire's lecture and a presentation on promoting a sustainable urban lifestyle by Ken Leinbach, executive director of Milwaukee's Urban Ecology Center.

Swearngin said he attended the teach-in after hearing about it from friends and seeing topics that interested him on the agenda.

He said he enjoyed Maguire's lecture, and picked up useful information about "all the things you can do on your own to save energy" from Leinbach.

Swearngin said he came away from the teach-in with a heightened awareness of social justice issues.

Maguire said he was happy to see so many students demonstrate "a passion for learning and a passion for social justice" at the teach-in.

"I have not seen this much activism among Marquette students in 34 years," he said. "It was like giving me a transfusion of hope."