Can Restorative Practices Improve School Climate and Curb Suspensions? PDF Download

Author: Catherine H. Augustine
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 112

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Book Description
Across the country, school districts, their stakeholders, and policymakers have become increasingly concerned about suspensions, particularly about suspending students from elementary school and disproportionately suspending ethnic/racial minority students. Suspended students are less likely to graduate, possibly because they miss the instructional time they need to advance academically. Restorative practices have gained buy-in in the education community as a strategy to reduce suspension rates. By proactively improving relationships among students and staff and by building a sense of community in classrooms and schools, students may be less inclined to misbehave. And by addressing severe misbehavior through a restorative approach, students might realize the impacts of their actions and be less likely to offend again. This study of the implementation of restorative practices in the Pittsburgh Public Schools district (PPS) in school years 2015-16 and 2016-17 represents one of the first randomized controlled trials of the effects of restorative practices on classroom and school climates and suspension rates. The authors examined a specific restorative practices program-the International Institute for Restorative Practices' SaferSanerSchoolsTM Whole-School Change program-implemented in a selected group of PPS schools under a program called Pursuing Equitable and Restorative Communities, or PERC. The researchers found that PERC achieved several positive effects, including an improvement in overall school climates (as rated by teachers), a reduction in overall suspension rates, and a reduction in the disparities in suspension rates between African American and white students and between low- and higher-income students.

Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 4

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Book Description
A study of Pittsburgh Public Schools' implementation of restorative practices represents one of the first randomized controlled trials of the effects of restorative practices on classroom and school climates and suspension rates.

Author: Margaret Thorsborne
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1351704052
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 67

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Book Description
Outlines the techniques to learn and apply when planning and facilitating school conferences. This book contains key documents such as preparation checklist, conference script, typical agreement, evaluation sheet and case studies. It includes guidance on: analysing school practice; deciding whether to hold a conference; and preparing a conference.

Author: Carol A. Mullen
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9783030358570
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The Handbook of Social Justice Interventions in Education features interventions in social justice within education and leadership, from early years to higher education and in mainstream and alternative, formal and informal settings. Researchers from across academic disciplines and different countries describe implementable social justice work underway in learning environments—organizations, programs, classrooms, communities, etc. Robust, dynamic, and emergent theory-informed applications in real-world places make known the applied knowledge base in social justice, and its empirical, ideological, and advocacy orientations. A multiplicity of social justice-oriented lenses, policies, strategies, and tools is represented in this Handbook, along with qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Alternative and conventional approaches alike advance knowledge and educational and social utility. To cover the field comprehensively the subject (i.e., social justice education and leadership) is subdivided into four sections. Part 1 (background) provides a general background of current social justice literature. Part II (schools) addresses interventions and explorations in preK-12 schools. Part III (education) covers undergraduate and graduate education and preservice teacher programs, classrooms, and curricula, in addition to teacher and student leadership in schools. Part IV (leadership) features educational leadership and higher education leadership domains, from organizational change efforts to preservice leader preparation programs, classrooms, etc. Part V (comparative) offers interventions and explorations of societies, cultures, and nations. Assembling this unique material in one place by a leading cast will enable readers easy access to the latest research-informed interventionist practices on a timely topic. They can build on this work that takes the promise of social justice to the next level for changing global learning environments and workplaces.

Author: Vah Seliskar, Holli
Publisher: IGI Global
ISBN: 1799838390
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 135

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Book Description
Restorative practices in schools emphasize a focus on non-punitive strategies to handle student disciplinary issues within schools and can include practices such as peer mediation, conflict resolution, restorative circles enabling a respectful dialogue, reparation of harmful and/or wrongful actions, and a primary emphasis on building relationships between all members of a school community. With a movement away from harsh disciplinary policies including suspensions, expulsions, and zero tolerance policies, restorative practices encourage school community members to work together in a productive and meaningful way without the use of exclusionary discipline practices, which often result in the removal of a student from a school community. Restorative practices emphasize inclusive strategies that aim to restore a school community and provide schools with strategies to improve their school climate overall. Transforming a School Community Through Restorative Practices: Emerging Research and Opportunities is a critical scholarly resource that can provide schools with the tools needed to successfully implement a restorative approach to effect change within a school. Featuring a wide range of topics such as conflict resolution, school safety, and school community, this book is ideal for teachers, counselors, school administrators, principals, academicians, education professionals, researchers, policymakers, and students.

Author: Oladapo Adekunle Ariyo
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : California
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Despite widespread acknowledgment about the viability of alternative behavioral interventions in our urban high schools across the nation, there is scarcity in research studies that specifically examine the impact of restorative justice practices on school climate. This mixed method study used a case study research design to examine the impact on school climate of the implementation of a restorative justice (RJ) practice in an urban high school in the State of California. Data were collected using interviews, survey, district documents and school site archival documents. Triangulation of data from these sources was used to validate the research findings. The high school chosen, California City High School (CCHS), a pseudonym, was a public high school located in a southeastern neighborhood of a large metropolitan city in southern California. District documents indicated that the school was in its third year of RJ implementation having completed the training necessary to facilitate the shift from traditional approaches of behavior management to a RJ approach, making this school a good fit for the study. This study highlighted the use of restorative circles and community building, and positive behavior support as the most pragmatic and effective RJ practices in the CCHS school environment. Students who have undergone restorative circles, and community building mediations, are perceived by teachers and administrator as exhibiting improved behavioral decision-making, and lower levels of recidivism when compared to similar age students before implementation of restorative circles. The school district's disciplinary data of 2007 through 2014 showed a marked decline in both instructional days lost to suspension and suspension rate following the implementation of restorative justice practices. Problems encountered during implementation at this school site involved inadequate and inconsistent training methodologies, time constraints for implementation, metrics for rating implementation success, and staff's attitude to change. This study would have benefited from the inclusion of data from additional schools and from parent and student interviews. The inclusion of additional schools would have enabled the analysis of staff perceptions at the school level. Hence, future studies should employ data from a larger number of schools to cross-validate the current findings. Some limitations should be noted when drawing conclusions from this research. The study examined staff and teacher survey and discipline referrals during three years of RJ implementation at CCHS. However, I did not have outsider observers to verify quality of RJ implementation, which many consider the "gold standard" for measuring fidelity of implementation. Also given CCHS has only been implementing its RJ program across a 3-year period, this study may not have captured the full effect of RJ implementation on school climate. Similar to most of the school climate research, this study was neither longitudinal nor experimental. This is a problem for the research because causal inferences are not possible. Future studies examining causal relationships with interventions or a longitudinal design are clearly warranted. A longitudinal design would also account for the fact that school climate perception is not static. It potentially changes and evolves during different points in the school year (e.g., proximity to holiday periods or examination periods) and corresponding with different events at the school (e.g., administrative changes or the introduction of a new initiative). Hence, longitudinal designs should be adopted in future research, as they would account for the impermanency of school climate perception.

Author: Howard Zehr
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 168099798X
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description
The four most popular restorative justice books in the Justice & Peacebuilding series—The Little Book of Restorative Justice: Revised and Updated, The Little Book of Victim Offender Conferencing, The Little Book of Family Group Conferences, and The Little Book of Circle Processes—in one affordable volume. And now with a new foreword from Howard Zehr, one of the founders of restorative justice! Restorative justice, with its emphasis on identifying the justice needs of everyone involved in a crime, is a worldwide movement of growing influence that is helping victims and communities heal while holding criminals accountable for their actions. This is not a soft-on-crime, feel-good philosophy, but rather a concrete effort to bring justice and healing to everyone involved in a crime. Circle processes draw from the Native American tradition of gathering in a circle to solve problems as a community. Peacemaking circles are used in neighborhoods, in schools, in the workplace, and in social services to support victims of all kinds, resolve behavior problems, and create positive climates. Each book is written by a scholar at the forefront of these movements, making this important reading for classrooms, community leaders, and anyone involved with conflict resolution.

Author: David B. Moore
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003801706
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
Setting Relations Right in Restorative Practice is a practical guide to using restorative processes, both in justice systems, to provide a healing response to harm, and in broader community contexts, to help people co-exist peacefully. Restorative processes can help to establish, maintain, deepen, and repair relationships, and to neutralise the conflict associated with negative relationships. The result is less conflict within people, between people, and between groups, and increasing individual and community wellbeing. These complex goals can be distilled to the single principle of setting relations right. The authors distil lessons from their decades of work at the frontline of restorative innovation. They outline an accurate, accessible theory that informs a restorative mindset, and describe in detail the corresponding skill set. Succinct, engaging case studies include refinements to existing programs in justice systems. Other case studies include the innovations of restorative responses to institutional abuse and to family violence and sexual harm, initiatives to increase psychological safety in schools and workplaces, and programs that support restorative ways-of-working across whole cities or regions. By applying elements from successful programs, practitioners can realise the broader reforming potential of restorative practice. This book is essential reading for restorative practitioners, administrators, and policymakers, for students and researchers – indeed, for anyone interested in the power and potential of restorative practice and other forms of deliberative decision-making.

Author: Daniel J. Losen
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807773492
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Book Description
Educators remove over 3.45 million students from school annually for disciplinary reasons, despite strong evidence that school suspension policies are harmful to students. The research presented in this volume demonstrates that disciplinary policies and practices that schools control directly exacerbate today's profound inequities in educational opportunity and outcomes. Part I explores how suspensions flow along the lines of race, gender, and disability status. Part II examines potential remedies that show great promise, including a district-wide approach in Cleveland, Ohio, aimed at social and emotional learning strategies. Closing the School Discipline Gap is a call for action that focuses on an area in which public schools can and should make powerful improvements, in a relatively short period of time. Contributors include Robert Balfanz, Jamilia Blake, Dewey Cornell, Jeremy D. Finn, Thalia González, Anne Gregory, Daniel J. Losen, David M. Osher, Russell J. Skiba, Ivory A. Toldson “Closing the School Discipline Gap can make an enormous difference in reducing disciplinary exclusions across the country. This book not only exposes unsound practices and their disparate impact on the historically disadvantaged, but provides educators, policymakers, and community advocates with an array of remedies that are proven effective or hold great promise. Educators, communities, and students alike can benefit from the promising interventions and well-grounded recommendations.” —Linda Darling-Hammond, Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education, Stanford University “For over four decades school discipline policies and practices in too many places have pushed children out of school, especially children of color. Closing the School Discipline Gap shows that adults have the power—and responsibility—to change school climates to better meet the needs of children. This volume is a call to action for policymakers, educators, parents, and students.” —Marian Wright Edelman, president, Children’s Defense Fund

Author: Katherine Evans
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 168099865X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 138

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Book Description
A fully revised & updated handbook for teachers and administrators on creating just and equitable learning environments for students; building and maintaining healthy relationships; healing harm and transforming conflict. Much more than a response to harm, restorative justice nurtures relational, interconnected school cultures. The wisdom embedded within its principles and practices is being welcomed at a time when exclusionary discipline and zero tolerance policies are recognized as perpetuating student apathy, disproportionality, and the school-to-prison pipeline. Relying on the wisdom of early proponents of restorative justice, the daily experiences of educators, and the authors’ extensive experience as classroom teachers and researchers, this Little Book guides the growth of restorative justice in education (RJE) into the future. Incorporating activities, stories, and examples throughout the book, three major interconnected and equally important aspects of restorative justice in education are explained and applied: creating just and equitable learning environments; building and maintaining healthy relationships; healing harm and transforming conflict. Chapters include: The Way We Do Things A Brief History of Restorative Justice in Education Beliefs and Values in Restorative Justice in Education Creating just and Equitable Learning Environments Nurturing Healthy relationships Repairing Harm and Transforming Conflict A Tale of Two Schools: Thoughts and Sustainability The Little Book of Restorative Justice in Education is a reference that practitioners can turn to repeatedly for clarity and consistency as they implement restorative justice in educational settings.