For Madeline Borrelli, a special education teacher in Brooklyn, N.Y., having NYPD-trained law enforcement officers in schools is a cut-and-dry issue: “School safety agents,” she said, using their official job title, “ … should not exist at all.”
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.
Formed in 2013 and established as a 501(c)3 nonprofit in 2014, the Florida Restorative Justice Association (FRJA) is the only entity in the state dedicated to supporting, strengthening and expanding Florida’s restorative justice practices (RJPs). In the last few years, the primary strategy to accomplish this task has been the creation of statewide conferences — one in Sarasota in September 2018 and one coming up in Broward County on Jan. 31, 2020.
When you are trying to make the shift to a restorative justice mindset, having even a few teachers, support personnel or administrators giving push-back can be downright exhausting.
Restorative practices and restorative justice centers honor, vulnerability and relationships. Through the process, participants learn the importance of relationships, communication, empathy and self-awareness. Restorative practices and restorative justice have been around for centuries, despite what Western culture says.
Walking back into my middle school classroom after being out the previous day at a training, I first noticed that the colorful plastic chairs were not stacked neatly on desks as they usually are. I could also see some papers scattered on the floor; usually my students are great about following the clean-up routine.
Against a vista of rolling hills and palm trees, a five-man film crew is setting up for a shoot. They white balance the cameras, adjust the tripods, play with composition. One man roams among them with a smaller camera, getting coverage of the shoot.
Restorative justice is a centuries-old approach that seeks to empower people to address the harms, needs and obligations that arise when a crime has been committed by bringing together victims, offenders and members of their respective communities.
Lara Bazelon’s groundbreaking book “Rectify: The Power of Restorative Justice After Wrongful Conviction” is a searing indictment of the criminal justice system’s penchant for flawed practices, depraved indifference toward offenders and wanton abuses of power.