Healthier Schools Restoratively
Most parents would agree that Victoria schools are among the very best in Canada. This reputation is built on parental involvement, teaching excellence, and student achievement in a wide range of academics, sports, community service, the arts, business, and other interest areas.
Can we improve?
Most definitely. Restorative practice (RP) is fast becoming the means to integrating conflict resolution into education as a primary life skill. Building social skills and addressing underlying needs is the best path to prevention. Working to create healthy learning environments that transform conflict into learning opportunities, promote social connection, cooperation and respect and focus on empowering students to address mistakes with positive solutions is a common sense approach we can all agree upon.
How?
Restorative conversations for example. A student feeling left out, ignored or unjustly treated, strikes out at another. A teacher or trained students convene a meeting with the whole class or with just the key parties. Three restorative questions are asked: What happened? What is the impact of this behaviour? What can be done to repair the harm? The parties decide on how to keep the peace and agree to provide feedback on their progress.
When?
Members of the whole school community, parents, students and staff can put restorative conversations into day-to-day practice. Talking things out in a respectful way helps to reduce stress and returns the focus to the excitement and challenge of learning new things and enjoying the support of peers.
Who?
School districts offering ‘Restitution Training’ (realrestitution.com) to teachers, administrators and other staff are strengthening restorative practices (RP) in our schools.
Collaboration with local Restorative Justice programs has helped advance RP pedagogy and practices in selected schools in the CRD. School administrators and Police Liaison Officers continue to call on local Restorative Justice programs to assist them in resolving conflicts and addressing offenses committed by students both in and out of school.
Results of Implementing Restorative Practices:
- Restorative practices increase the capacity for empathetic understanding and social responsibility; these are essentials for citizens in a democracy.
- Research shows an increase in student achievement and a reduction in fights and bullying.
- Parents feel more comfortable to visit their schools.
- Among teachers, collaboration increases.
- School administrators can spend less time on discipline matters and more time on teaching-learning activities.
- Schools practicing zero tolerance gain more productive results by engaging students in effective problem solving rather than suspending them from school.
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