Poster #90 - Student Agreements; Outcomes of Restorative Circles in Schools

• In Event: 1-005 - Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Section - Education, Schooling

Integrative Statement

Restorative Justice (RJ) programs are often implemented into high-risk schools as alternatives to ineffective zero tolerance policies in efforts to deal with high rates of violence and delinquency. Restorative Circles (RC) is a particular RJ approach which provides a space for those involved in conflict to repair harm through a facilitated dialogue process. The goals of RC are to hold a space that promotes understanding, self-responsibility and action. School-based RJ has been gaining popularity within the United States but empirical research is lacking. It is important understand how students, often high-risk and/or underrepresented adolescents, respond to and experience RC given their experience with traditional punitive measures such as detentions, suspensions and arrests. The aim of the present study was to provide an analysis of one of the products that comes out of each restorative circle, agreements.

At the end of each restorative circle participants discuss next steps, this includes coming up with agreed upon actions or “agreements.” These agreements can include anything that the participants feel will help them move forward from the situation they are working through. Some examples of agreements include: not engaging with others in the circle in the future, writing apology letters, or returning items that may have been taken. An important aspect of these agreements is that the adult facilitators do not provide youth with assistance in developing these agreements. The agreements are completely participant driven, down to the wording. Over two years 219 Restorative Circles took place at high school X with 287 circle participants. In the current study all agreements from each of the 219 restorative circles were analyzed. Student participant’s in these circles were 58% female and 98% of participants identified as African-American. Participants ranged in age from 13 to 19 and were from all grade levels in high school.

Each Circle yielded between one and five agreements. For the purposes of this study all agreements were compiled into a document and then four members of the research team independently coded the agreements into themes. These themes were then discussed and finalized. Themes included repairing relationships, returning material goods, apologies, no-contact agreements, and personal growth. Examples from each of the five themes will be provided along with a discussion of the restorative principles each exemplifies.

Research on restorative approaches often looks at implementation and outcomes but a lot can be learned by examining the “artifacts” that are produced as a function of program participation. Understanding what types of agreements youth are making may help explain some of the outcomes (i.e., improved relationships) that are often seen with these types of programs. Perhaps youth are internalizing some of the underlying principles of restorative approaches and using them to inform their agreements. No study has examined agreements although they are the only tangible product that comes out of these circles. Every participant must agree upon and write out the agreements and then sign the document. This work can help both researchers and practitioners better understand how high-risk adolescents experience RC.

Author

• Lily Ortega, Colorado State University
  Presenting Author