Hello, I'm Grover Silcox.

Welcome to our special program on restorative practices, Community and relationships.

We live in a world where all too often conflict spurs more conflict, and violence becomes the norm, where our institutions and leaders reach automatically for punitive measures.

As the answer to these problems in our schools, our justice system, and our communities.

Restorative practices, however, are proven alternative approaches leading to long term success in preventing conflicts, resolving problems and building community.

Joining me to discuss the importance of restorative practices are two experts from the International Institute for Restorative Practices.

Henry McClendon, Jr. IIRP's director of Community Engagement, and Keith Hickman, Vice President for Partnerships.

Welcome, gentlemen.

Thank you for having us.

My pleasure.

You know, we often hear about all the problems, you know, especially at our schools, that conflicts and how kids are misbehaving or not learning.

But rarely do we ever hear about solutions.

Well, restorative practices provide solutions and a paradigm shift.

Let's start out with a definition.

What what are restorative practices?

Sure.

Great question.

Thanks for having us here.

You're welcome.

For you and your audience, if you think about our traditional justice system and ask three questions, was a law broken?

Who broke it?

And how much punishment are we going to give up?

It's adversarial and success is measured by the amount of punishment applied and separation Restorative Justice.

Ask a different question Who was harmed?

Who caused the harm, and what will it take to restore everyone?

The community.

It's a communal process and both the actual victim and actual offender are brought together to discuss it and success is based on how much relationships are restored and harm is repaired.

Restorative practice includes restorative justice, but the aim of restorative practice is to actually proactively build community.

And then invariably, whenever you put more than two people in a room together, there's going to be a conflict.

When conflict occurs, you measure that, you address it by repairing harm and restoring relationships.

So that's the difference between.

Right and the more typical paradigm that we have seen from the beginning of time, I guess are more exclusionary discipline, such as zero tolerance and out-of-school suspensions.

What restorative practices does is take a look at the relationships, build them and solve the problem.

Right.

You know, so it's true.

I mean, it's you know, first of all, you talk about building relationships as well.

To build a relationship, you have to have some social capital, what we call social capital investment.

So on the proactive component of that, we have to be really strengthening relationships and building community.

When we do that effectively, then we're most likely to repair, harm and protect for particularly for those who have been harmed.

We give them a voice and a space and opportunity to actually engage in what they need, to feel comfortable, to feel confident, to feel safe in situations where those who have caused harm are returning back to those communities.

So the proactive and we call it 80% of the time we should be working on so that we can do the 20% of the repairing harm and the restorative piece more effectively.

Right.

I think in one of your documents, you had a quote from an attorney and a social justice activist who who pretty much echoed what you were saying.

The quote was, Criminal justice harms people who harm people to show that harming people is wrong.

That really captures the idea that you were espousing.

And so give us a scenario in which restorative practices would apply.

You know, a typical scenario, maybe a case history.

I can quickly share my own experience with restorative practice.

Several years ago, my dad, who actually just passed away a few weeks ago, 92 years old, but he was assaulted by two young men that were actually the stepsons of a gentleman my dad had mentored.

Long story short, right after I learned about restorative justice, we actually were able to go through a restorative justice process with them.

And just before they were sentenced, we sat around the table.

The young man had to express actually what they had done.

Family members had questions, and when it was all done, I asked I asked the young man how that process it impacted him and what the judge did, because the judge was extremely harsh on him.

He said it wasn't the judge.

The judge really didn't matter.

He said when I had to have that conversation with your family, I realized then that I didn't want to be the person I'd become.

And it changed literally changed his life and the impact that that sort of my dad had had on his on both of their families.

So it's an opportunity to get behind the underlying issue and to move forward.

How are we going to behave moving forward?

And it's just a positive experience, right?

It's getting to the root of the behavior to change the behavior as opposed to, again, going back to traditional methods like zero tolerance or suspensions.

It's just to really that's just addressing the problem, to stop the problem, but not to prevent it from ever happening again.

If I can phrase it this way, I tell people, people think, you know, we have a crime problem.

We don't have a crime problem, we have a relationship problem.

And crime is just the symptom of that.

Deal with the criminal issue, but deal with the underlying issue that caused it.

When you do that, then you'll reduce the examples and you reduce the incidents of conflict.

Right.

And restorative practices has developed a whole host of strategies for implementing them, correct?

Correct.

So that when you're trying to get a school or a school system or any organization really to embrace them, it's not like you said, well, you're all you're right.

Here's the idea.

You're on your own.

No, here are the tools you need.

And in fact, so, yes, there's what we call a continuum of practices.

Right.

And if you think about a continuum of practices, like a spectrum on on the on the left side of the continuum would be restorative dialog.

So how do we have conversations with what are the questions that we need to be asking when there's harm caused or when we're trying to build community?

How do we actually deal with situations where you need informal conversations so that we can maintain the dignity of folks who are involved in conflict and to the far right of that continuum, We need more formal processes that involve more people, more time and more resources, which are called our restorative conferencing piece.

So we do have a set of a continuum of practices that we apply that support our framework, that when we do things with people, we're more likely to seek success.

So we do things with people instead of to for or not at all.

And when you apply that into systems like K-12 education that are tend to be highly, purely punitive or have a history of being highly punitive or in community conflict or even in mediation to support mediation or workplace.

When you apply these practices, what it allows us to do is it allows the individuals to develop a set of competencies and skills that in reciprocity reinforce the practice itself.

So there's a couple of things happening, though, right?

You're able to implement a practice that's giving people the ability to manage conflict and own their conflict, and they're also using the skills and tools to be able to actually reinforce that practice and that concept.

And that's that's critically important for young people and students in K-through-12.

Right.

And that breaks down into basically two sub sets.

Right.

Repair and community building.

Yeah.

So the community building and we talk about 80% of your time ought to be on the proactive side building community.

Right.

So whether it's in a classroom or in an office setting, one one of the norms that we create to work together, how do we get to know each other a little bit better?

You bring people together from different places.

We all have different experiences.

One is not necessarily right or wrong.

They're different.

And we need to have conversations to better understand each other and to set the norms for how we'll engage.

And invariably, if you put more than two people in a room, at some point there's going to be a conflict.

In fact, if honest, you ever had a conflict with yourself.

Right.

So you're the one that needs to be restored.

But creating that proactive side, how do you bring new people into the classroom?

How do you bring new people into the office setting?

Setting up systems where they be filled, welcomed, and that environment.

Right.

And when restorative practices are calling it the whole school model or the whole practices model in which it's not just embraced in in piecemeal ways, but used as a whole concept so that the whole school or organization has this implemented in every possible way.

So the environment, I think you call it the climate is improved.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So the whole school model approach really is that everyone is building community.

So every stakeholder in that community has a, you know, really needs to be a part of shaping policy practices that should be a part of managing conflict.

We don't want to still conflict from individuals.

We want to give them an opportunity to actually resolve conflict.

And so we involve all stakeholders.

It really does create an environment where school administrators are working closely with teachers and educators, which are actually working closely with students, those close relational bonds, because at the end of the day, the whole school model allows the most beneficiary person and the group in that stakeholder group are the students.

And so what we're doing in our whole school change model is that we're saying from school resource officer all the way to to student, we need to be building communities so that we're actually reducing and stopping putting out fires and that we actually have a human and human approach to resolving conflict.

Right.

And, you know, it it began, I guess, with schools.

Right.

Education.

But it is now expanded the restorative practices approach to juvenile justice, to corporations and to community organizations.

Right.

It's gone way beyond the original concept.

So I think this also giving credit.

So restorative justice and we say the distinction between restorative justice and restorative practice, right?

So there are people like K Prentice Howard there that were involved with the Restorative Justice Peace, the restorative practice.

And doing that proactive side was really Ted and Susan Wachtell through through the IIRP that they developed that what restorative practice is not technically not new, the application of it, the intentional, skillful application of it is what's being done.

What we're working on now, the graduate school is helping to expose all different areas of expertise, whether like you mentioned, juvenile justice, schools, neighborhoods.

But this stuff also works at a family level.

It works in wherever two or more people are around.

It works.

Well.

It's amazing.

So I think it's fascinating the idea of you call them community circles, where you you had mentioned it earlier about bringing the person who harmed and the person who was harmed together, and maybe other participants as well.

Family members, witnesses, anyone who is a stakeholder in that scenario.

And they share each other's feeling, their feelings and, you know, you even have the person who caused the problem or the harm to apologize based on now how they feel, regret that they they were part of the problem.

You know, John Brathwaite, a criminologist who studies it, has a phrase we talked about most people want to do things.

Most people want to do the right thing most of the time.

And I believe that to be true.

And so we just don't put people together in a circle and say have at it.

You know, there is a lot of prep work that goes into it.

There's a lot of scholarship and thought and research that's gone behind this.

And so we want to make sure that when we are bringing people together, I talk about the continuum of practice that we're using the continuum of practices to have that kind of formal circle or that kind of impromptu conversation, because there should be no surprises in this.

We shouldn't just put people together and have them be highly vulnerable.

It's already a highly vulnerable situation to begin with.

Right.

So what to make sure people are really having that dialog in advance?

That's a really using those question.

We're using the question cards and questions to get people prepared for the conversation so that the person who's most harmed doesn't get rearmed, that they're feel like their needs are being met and that the person who's causing the harm has an opportunity to make it right.

Again, we're not talking about, you know, that there's no consequences or that there is no accountability or we're talking about isn't getting beneath the accountability and the consequences so that you're repairing harm because most people are going back to the same environment and setting where the harm was caused.

Right.

How often do you hear, you know, and these are part of the myth that I guess you have to dispel.

you're just trying to, you know, let them off the hook.

You know, you're not addressing the problem.

You're you're just being easier on people that that far from what restorative approaches does.

When restorative practice is implemented in a justice issue appropriately, the person who has caused harm, that's been my experience.

They'll say it was the most challenging, difficult for them, like the case with my dad, the young man, Tobin.

I was in the courtroom when the judge read the riot act to them, and I was like, I almost felt bad for him.

He said That was nothing.

He said when I had to sit there and actually have a conversation, hear the impact, have a conversation with you about the impact that I had, cause it was in that space that I decided I didn't want to be the person I had become.

And one of my former life, I was Southeast Michigan area director for Prison Fellowship Ministry, so I spent a lot of time in prisons and I can't tell you the number of individuals who would say the very same thing is when I had to really be confronted with what I did.

And the traditional justice system doesn't do that.

It validates the law.

It does not address the relational nature of a conflict.

Right.

And do these practices really help reduce recidivism, whether it's behavior problems in school or or in the juvenile justice or justice system?

I'll give you a subtle example.

There was a school, East English Village high school in Detroit.

They had over 1700 student code violations in one semester.

Their staff were trained the summer.

The next semester they had about 535.

And when you went through and disaggregated what the offenses were, they were all relational issues.

So but here's where leadership matters.

The principal that school at that time, her theory was sheet.

She said, I inspected what I expected.

So she was constantly working with teachers, writing restorative practices into their school plan.

She was checking with students and the relationship among students and students, students and staff, administrators and the rest of the school totally changed because they began applying this restorative framework.

Right?

I think leadership.

Matters.

Yeah, I was going to ask about the outcomes and you, you, you too, fellows have probably seen them.

Yeah.

The transformation from what it was to what restorative practices did for this school.

Yeah.

Grover I've had the opportunity to to be a part of some, some pretty, some national research studies on restorative practices, one in Pittsburgh, one with Johns Hopkins University.

I've talked to a number of school districts that's implemented, case studies.

So, you know, I've really been a part of seeing the outcomes and seeing it change over time.

And I'll tell you that, you know, it may not been the kind of outcomes we were looking for in the beginning, but over the last 15 to 20 years, we're starting to see some tremendous results, including outcomes in the academic, academic outcomes for students in seeing changes in grades.

And we're seeing competency development for lifelong skills for students.

It's not just the behavior piece.

We're also seeing impact in other areas.

There's a couple of new research studies out there for the Learning Institute policy with on Hammond Darling that talks about how the practices itself is having an impact on on lack of academic indicators.

We know we've already known for quite a while that it has influence.

It impacted positive school culture and climate, but we're seeing it in other areas as well.

And I would start I would say we're also seeing it adopted in workplaces in my state.

You know, in New York City, we're seeing, you know, the opportunities to apply restorative practices with a mediation.

And it is actually an executive order by the former mayor de Blasio and the office of the administrator and trial hearings are using restorative practices with mid conflict mediation for city government offices to reduce those conflicts.

So we're starting to see it really reach and stretch and deepen beyond just the K-12 space.

Right.

And it seems to me that the more an organization embraces them, again, going back to the whole school model, the more effective they are.

Because I think at this point when we see the burgeoning population in prison and kids repeating the same problems and eventually dropping out because it's never really resolved, we can see how these kind of practices, like you say, get to the root of the problem, because otherwise it's just going to keep happening.

Having how many inmates come out of prison and actually have more problems because they, you know, prisons become the best school in the world for crime.

Well, prisons was just in a prison this past Monday.

There are prisons where they are adopting restorative frameworks.

There are some of the best restorative practitioners I know are actually behind the walls.

So I would want your audience to direct to to understand that restorative practices works in any environment where you have two or more people at a family level.

And Detroit, we have groups, they call it their circle keepers, where they've adopted it in a neighborhood.

They use it to address neighborhood problems.

You have justice systems that are starting to use it.

Keith talks about, even on an international level, Keith talks about, even on an international level, Keith talks about, even on an international level, the UN, how they're talking about issues and how restorative practices relates to that.

So no matter where you are, there is an opportunity to use this to strengthen community.

And now what we've been talking about schools where there's been a problem, even if you have a school that is technically doesn't have a lot of problems, the application of restorative practice still helps that school to improve outcomes for kids and to equip them to be effective when they go into the workforce.

Right?

Right.

Yeah.

I was going to say that, you know, these practices, you know, should be employed, these practices should be implemented even where there are no problems.

Right.

Because it's how we deal with one another.

Right.

No matter who we are.

Right.

Well, relationships are the most basic form of our existence.

More than breathing, eating, sleeping.

It's relationships.

It's the fundamental human dynamic of who we are.

And I just wanted to add that, you know, for 40 plus years, this has been working in the Lehigh Valley Community Service Foundation and Buchman Academy have been applying these practices across a number of milieus, including the reentry programs, the school reentry programs, foster care.

There is a conference center that they do where they work with families.

It's called RC, where they're doing family group decision making with families to make sure that families are really creating plans with professionals in the protection and safety of children.

So drug and alcohol treatment facility.

So you're seeing even even the 40 plus years here in the Lehigh Valley in this area, which is tremendously important because that has influenced and shaped how we've applied it around the world.

So right here in Bethlehem and this little area really was a spark plug for for a lot of that work.

And we still come back and we consider that kind of not so much a laboratory lab rat laboratory where we can sit at the place where we actually continue to learn, grow and sharpen the practices itself.

Right now, the IIRP’s graduate school trained students in the practices, and there are various practitioners out there who have learned from the institute.

And how do you get an organism, how do you get an organization to embrace them?

Because again, a lot of it is a philosophical shift as well as an operational shift.

So if you have if you have someone who, you know, the principal of a school, that the head of a school district or whomever, and they're not philosophically, you know, compatible, how do you get them to embrace it?

How do you get them on your side?

How do you get them to see the benefits?

Yeah, I'll just take kind of I think what we try to do is to help any leader that wants to incorporate and implement restorative practices, help them understand that it's an alignment process.

There are things that are already working in these situations, particularly K-12, and how do we actually improve and enhance what they are trying to do.

So it's not a dichotomous process.

It's a process of integration, it's a process of alignment, it's a process of buy in, it's a process of knowledge integration.

We also understand that it's a it's a human capital experience for many businesses and even schools where there is value in and there's value in the resources of people that are already in that space and in that setting.

And so if we can leverage the best of the people as resources, then we create the best possibility and probability of shaping that culture in a positive way.

So the way I've approached many school administrators is I listen a model restorative practices with them, and and I really try to understand, you know, how they can with me co-create how to adopt the practice, continue practices in the spaces and the challenges that they're having.

Because most folks call us with a reactionary problem.

And so we can take that reactionary problem and see it as an opportunity to do something proactive, to create the kind of possibility and the purpose of what they're trying to accomplish and then have a set of practices that really does that with people they tend to buy in pretty quickly.

Right?

A simple question is, are you satisfied with the outcomes you're seeing right now?

Is what you're doing right now?

Is that working.

Right?

If you do more of what you're doing right now, do you expect that to get a different outcome if not as Keith, I love the quote.

You know, let's explore what are the possibilities.

Right.

You know, what what what would be what would be different for you if all of this stuff wasn't happening?

If you could reduce this, what would be different for you?

Right.

Right.

If you could reduce this, what would be different for your students?

So you began to expose the possibilities.

And then so how do we get from there to here?

And we do that together.

And there have been I mean, there's scores of teachers, schools that have we take them through that process and they begin to change.

The only thing I would say, too, is the importance of an individual or a spark, right?

Some time you may be the only one that has an understanding of this.

Right.

And but don't diminish your ability to be a change agent in your and your circle of influence.

Right.

So in a lot of cases, you have that person who is intrinsically interested.

They get it right and they can be the best agents to proliferate it in their schools or in their organizations.

So a buy in start with those who buy it to begin with.

Right.

And they can help sell it to everyone else.

Right.

And and then see the changes.

How about caregivers and and parents.

That matter, whoever?

Yeah, well.

Actually, they're they're a critical stakeholder group.

But that's that's one that's really difficult sometimes for school administrators and educators to reach.

So that's why this is this is a community process, right?

It's not just about schools.

It's not just about work.

The ecosystem is larger than that.

It's about the people in community where you learn live, play, work.

That is the container by which we're trying to really have transformation.

And that can happen with every stakeholder group in that environment from student to school leader.

Right.

Another quick example for you had a school.

We're having all types of problems.

They set the expectation for their students to use restorative practice, and it became a point where students owned it.

I had one counselor principal tell me, he said a group of kids came to his office, said, Hey, we need to do a circle.

Can we use your office?

He said, Sure, come on in.

And you can say, Well, no, we don't need you.

We just need your office space.

They owned it, right?

So they began to be the change agents in their school.

Got it.

So finally, Keith and Henry, how can people learn more about restorative practices?

Where can they go?

IIRP dot edu.

Yep.

Got it.

We hope this program sparks that interest and they can learn a whole lot more.

I know I did and it was fascinating.

Thanks for having me.

I think it's an answer that we desperately need.

Thank you, Keith and Henry, for sharing your insights and helping us understand restorative practices and how they can improve and sustain the health and well-being of our schools, workplaces, justice system and communities overall.

For Lehigh Valley Public Media, I'm Grover Silcox.

Thanks for watching.