Restorative School Culture

RESTORATIVE SCHOOL CULTURE

Restorative practice creates a learning environment based on genuine community, where there is an experience of deep belonging, respect for each person’s unfolding story, and a commitment to practicing common values. This foundation of community is intentionally woven into all aspects of the explicit learning curriculum at school.

The starting point for building a school culture that demonstrates these qualities is the practice of community circles among everyone in the school community. It is in circle that we start to see the true value in each individual and honor the story that each person is living. This is the basis for genuine respect for ourselves and others and it is a commitment to making sure that we are making positive contributions to our community, instead of causing harm. In circle, we practice living from our core values and make that the foundation for how we choose to be together, knowing that our welfare is inseparable from the wellness of the whole community.

Interrupting the school-to-prison pipeline

Within the context of a restorative school community, there are restorative justice practices that can be applied to heal harms that occur as a result of conflict and wrongdoing. These processes have a focus on understanding harms and their root causes, taking shared responsibility for the harms, and committing to actions for making amends and preventing future harm.

This means intentionally choosing to move away from discipline practices that rely on authoritative control, rule enforcement, imposed punishment, and exclusion. Schools with higher rates of suspension and expulsion have higher student absences, higher rates of misconduct, and lower graduation rates. These punitive and exclusionary practices remove students from their normal learning environment and put them at greater risk for adopting harmful behaviors. When a student is suspended or expelled from school, they are more likely to drop out of school and enter the criminal justice system. This is known as the School-to-Prison Pipeline.

The objective is to develop practices and policies that effectively address wrongdoing while keeping everyone connected to their learning community and assuring that everyone feels welcomed and accepted as whole human beings. While no harmful behavior is condoned, we affirm the innate value that each individual brings, even in the moments when their behavior does not reflect that value.

A spectrum of practices are used, all grounded in respect, accountability, and trust, which are appropriate to the nature of the harm and the age of the individuals involved:

Classroom circles can be used to address harmful issues in class culture, where teachers and students take shared responsibility to restore balance to class relationships.

Administrators, teachers, staff, and students are trained to use restorative questions to reflect on incidents that cause harm, identify underlying causes of conflict, help all involved to be responsible and accountable, and come to agreements about what actions need to be taken to repair relationships. These questions are universal to Restorative Justice and form the core of restorative dialogue, including restorative conferences:

- From your perspective, what happened
-What were you thinking and feeling at the time?
-Who has been affected by what happened, and how?
-What has been the hardest thing for you?
-What do you think needs to be done to make things right?

Student leaders can use circle processes and restorative dialogue to address student conflicts

For more serious issues, school staff in various roles can facilitate restorative conferences aimed at suspension or expulsion diversion, and include follow-up to support the student to successfully complete his or her restorative action plan for making things right.

We have developed a 12-week program, called an accountability circle, for students who are referred by school administration, possibly as an alternative to expulsion. Youth take part in a restorative conference and weekly youth circles that include critical dialogue on a range of important topics and mentoring on building a greater sense of integrity, decision-making, and life skills.

The objective is to develop practices and policies that effectively address wrongdoing while keeping everyone connected to their learning community and assuring that everyone feels welcomed and accepted as whole human beings. While no harmful behavior is condoned, we affirm the innate value that each individual brings, even in the moments when their behavior does not reflect that value.