Race-Conscious Parent Engagement and Restorative Justice: Lessons Learned From the First Three Years of Two Interventions to Disrupt Disproportionate Discipline in Rivertown

• In Event: 16.061 - Roundtable Session 4
  In Roundtable Session: 16.061-4 - Community-Based Interventions to Disrupt Racially Disproportionate School Discipline in an Urban School District

Abstract

This paper will discuss two interrelated research interventions developed through a school-community-university collaboration to address the problem of racially disproportionate discipline: race-conscious parent engagement and a restorative justice pilot at the middle school level. Building upon critical work in parent engagement (e.g., Beckett, Glass, & Moreno, 2012; Delgado-Gaitan, 1991, 1993; Dyrness, 2008; Perez Carreon, Drake, & Barton, 2005), we first report on a community-based race-conscious parent engagement project in which marginalized parents are in charge of the means and process of their engagement with schools, rather than assimilating to the school’s norms of conduct. The paper will then discuss the second intervention: a restorative justice pilot that seeks to move away from punitive zero tolerance and towards community-building, communication-based “talk circles” for prevention of, intervention in, and debriefing after school-based conflicts, all with an emphasis on understanding and discussing the root causes of conflict and transgressions rather than criminalizing such behavior (Gregory, Clawson, Davis, & Gerewitz, 2014). When implemented skillfully and systematically, restorative justice can result in more positive teacher-student relationships, a reduction in suspensions overall, and a reduction in the racialized discipline gap (Gregory, Clawson, Davis, & Gerewitz, 2014). Presenters will discuss recommendations with regard to critical education with preservice and inservice teachers around whiteness, white privilege, and race-conscious pedagogy.

Authors

• Denise Gray Yull, State University of New York

• Marguerite A. Wilson, Binghamton University - SUNY

• Lawrence Parham