News & Announcements
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Schools
The US Department of Education launched its #RethinkDiscipline Campaign with an all-day kickoff on July 22. LA Unified School District's restorative justice efforts win White House applause. Rochester, NY, School District Superintendent Bolgen Vargas visited the White House to discuss restorative practices in school discipline.
Education Week’s Research Center issued a new report, "Social and emotional learning: Perspectives from America's schools," which shows, among other things, "a particularly large expansion in the use of restorative practices" over the past three years.
An EdWeek article by Evie Blad suggests, "Urban Districts Embrace Social-Emotional Learning." Plus, a New York Times Op Ed piece by David Bornstein argues that "Teaching Social Skills Improve Grades and Lives."
ASCD (the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development) sees similarities and a need for connection between "whole child, social & emotional learning (SEL), character education and school climate."
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College and high school students showed up to make their voices heard at a conference on restorative practices for New York City schools, in the Bronx, NY. Why? The students are hungry for learning. Mostly from disadvantaged backgrounds, they see their education as a way to liberty and freedom.
The college students were invited to “Transformative Practices & Restorative Justice Conference: A Celebration and Call to Action,” by their education professor at Lehman College, City University of New York (CUNY), David Fletcher, Ed.D. Together with 250 educators, school administrators and community representatives, Fletcher is building a community to implement restorative practices in NYC schools.
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Students and teachers from Maine schools that are implementing the SaferSanerSchools Whole-School Change program as part of a 5-year RAND study speak about the positive impact in the classroom of circles and other informal restorative practices. These practices give everyone a chance to be heard.
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The borderlands of Pakistan and Afghanistan are a dangerous and violent place. But it is here that a student of restorative justice, Ali Gohar, founder of Just Peace Initiatives, based in Peshawar, Pakistan, has worked to reinvigorate and reinvent traditional conflict resolution practices.
In this tribal region, inhabited largely by ethnic Pukhtoon, wrongdoing can spiral into cycles of vengeance. Family feuds can last for generations. For instance, nearly 60 years after the event, a man avenged his father’s murder by in turn killing the original murderer’s grandson. Revenge killings continued back and forth between the two families until a total of a dozen people were dead. Without the intervention of the jirga – a tribal council “organized by wise, respectable, greybeard elders whose decision is unanimous, acceptable to all community members” (Gohar, n.d.) – the cycle of violence would have continued. The jirga sent representatives to each family and convinced them to end the feud “for the sake of God” with no blood money exchanging hands (Lofton, 2015).
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During the IIRP Europe 2015 Conference in Budapest, Hungary, Romanian social worker Izabella Kasza discussed her work with a displaced Roma population in the city of Cluj. The group of 300 families lives and works in poor conditions near the city's landfill.
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As the restorative practices social movement gathers steam in schools, justice, communities and beyond, practitioners, academics and advocates are looking for new ways to connect and work together to common purpose.
The Peace Alliance, a national grassroots advocacy group based in Washington, D.C., that promotes practical methods for reducing violence, transforming conflict and enhancing cooperation, sees as one of its functions to facilitate these cross connections.
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Justice
The New York Times quotes Dr. Keith Jensen, co-author of a study showing young children have a sense of justice: "[G]iven a choice [toddlers] would rather restore things to help the victim than punish the perpetrator."
Law Street examines "How Can Restorative Justice Change the Criminal System?" illustrated with a number of embedded videos.
Restorative justice pioneer Howard Zehr was “roasted” during a celebration of the anniversary edition of his groundbreaking book, “Changing Lenses.”
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The first IIRP Europe Conference brought 160 people from 23 countries to Budapest, Hungary, on June 10-12, 2015. For three intense days, participants shared stories, practices and research on restorative practices in criminal justice, education, social services, the workplace, faith communities and other settings. They heard how restorative practices are overcoming centuries of distrust between the Roma people and others in Romania, reintegrating prison inmates back into society in Hungary and helping heal victims of sexual abuse in Ireland. In circle discussions, they brainstormed how restorative practices can improve civil society all over the world. Everyone left the conference inspired to take what they learned back home.
Each day began with plenary presentations, attended by all the participants, followed by a large selection of “breakout” sessions.
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Schools
Across the U.S., schools are Minding the Discipline Gap in Education between white and minority students by turning to restorative practices:
- The Oakland, CA, school board unanimously votes to end suspensions for willful defiance and funds restorative justice.
- Education activists in Charlotte-Mecklenburg, NC, want schools to adopt restorative justice as an alternative to suspension. (See also O.N.E. Charlotte pushes for restorative justice in CMS.)
- Denver, CO, Public Schools increase their investment in restorative practices, reducing their suspensions since 2005 from 16,000 to 6,300 and expulsions from over 250 to 67.
- John Marshall Law School has been awarded a grant to expand anti-violence restorative justice work in a Chicago Public School.
- Eighteen Loudoun, VA, high, middle & elementary schools adopt restorative practices and decrease suspensions in incidents of fighting, bullying, harassment and disrespect.
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When civil unrest erupted in Baltimore, MD, during the last week of April 2015, schools that had been implementing restorative practices all year employed talking circles to help students feel safe, heard and restored. Unlike their counterparts in many other schools in the city, these schools felt prepared to respond in a way that strengthened their school communities.
“It was a tense few days,” says Corey Basmajian, principal of Windsor Hills Elementary/Middle School, in West Baltimore, referring to the feeling not only in his school but throughout Baltimore.
In West Baltimore, protests had begun April 18 over the police’s treatment of Freddie Gray, who would die on April 19 of spinal injuries sustained during an arrest April 12. By Friday April 25, some of the protests had turned violent. The unrest peaked the night of Monday April 27, after Gray’s funeral. Baltimore City Schools responded by closing on Tuesday April 28. But when students returned to classes on Wednesday, everyone was anxious about how they would act in light of all the unrest taking place in the city.
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