Restorative justice: Several high school students sit in a circle of chairs having a discussion

Breaking walls, building bridges: A call for restorative justice in school discipline

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Imagine waking up each morning with no hope for the day ahead, navigating a minefield of potential conflicts with your body on high alert. That was my reality as a marginalized youth — misunderstood, labeled as a troublemaker and cast out without a chance to reconcile and evolve. Growing up with anxiety in school is an all-too-common experience that perpetuates a cycle of fear and resentment. It’s time to acknowledge and address this narrative that adversely affects our youth’s learning experiences and the education system. Restorative justice programs are part of the solution.

Schools face pressure to take harder line on discipline: closeup of students hand holding red pen with class in desks in background

Schools face pressure to take harder line on discipline

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As kids' behavior reaches crisis points after the stress and isolation of pandemic shutdowns, many schools are facing pressure from critics to rethink their approaches to discipline — including policies intended to reduce suspensions and expulsions.

Florida: Very large circle of people hold hands indoors

As youths face hefty court fines, some states find new ways for them to pay for their crimes

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Courts have long mandated fees, aiming to hold youth accountable, deter them from future crime and often to cover the justice system’s administrative and other costs. Yet, advocates of juvenile justice reform contend that those conventional methods of demanding accountability from young offenders are counterproductive, neither serving the interests of youth nor their victims

New Juvenile Prison: Large, 2story, modern red brick and light cement building with front lawn and low shrubbery

Opinion: New, multimillion-dollar jail is no panacea for juvenile offenders

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How one prisoner, sentenced as a teen, sees spending millions on new juvenile jail:

For almost 25 years, I’ve been on North Carolina’s death row. The people on death row who have signed onto my letter protesting that new jail – and more than 40 other men on death row who wanted to sign but were physically unable to position themselves to do so – were confined as children to boot camps, reformatories, detention centers and youth prisons.

Two people shake hands.

Opinion: More reparative justice, less restorative justice is needed

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Some juvenile and criminal justice reform advocates laud restorative justice — it requires those who commit crimes to make amends, rather than merely face a prison sentence — as a potent solution to curbing crime. This model presumes that the wrongdoing is corrected when a defendant’s apology and efforts to take accountability somehow satisfy the victim. Restitution is measured by the defendant engaging in dialogue with the victim, alongside a neutral third-party, for months, if not years.

Opinion: Disruptive students, often facing challenges at home and in their communities, deserve acts of “restorative justice”

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This is how practitioners of restorative justice approach things: First, focus on building strong, authentic relationships in a community, including schools that now are reopening.  Then, if and when community members or students make a mistake or cause harm, rather than simply looking at which rule was broken and which punishment should be prescribed, collaborate to help ensure that the erring individual has the space and support to hold herself or himself accountable.

restorative justice: The phrase "Reparations for black community " on a banner in men's hand with blurred background.

Opinion: Restorative Justice Is Used to Legitimize Oppressive Systems

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Imagine building a house on unstable ground and then only working to address the cracks in the walls, uneven floors and leaking roof, all symptoms of a faulty foundation. Many contractors would find this unreasonable, if not dangerous. 

Yet that is essentially what we have done in the United States. After having built our nation's house on unstable ground, we have stubbornly clung to the irrational idea that all we need to do is fix the resulting, cosmetic issues. In doing so, we have begun to use restorative justice as one of those "easy fixes," to the detriment of both the practice and the communities asked to participate in it. The practices and approaches the Western world today refers to as “restorative justice” have roots in indigenous, including indigenous African, peacemaking and ways of being in community.