Effects of the Whole School Restorative Justice Program

Effects of the Whole School Restorative Justice Program

Restorative approaches are practices aimed at making peace, preventing further harm, and building community. The Whole School Restorative Justice Program (WSRJ) is designed to promote these practices in the school setting. It uses multi-level strategies to provide an alternative to zero-tolerance approaches, which have raised suspension rates nationally, especially among minority youth. Tier 1 is regular classroom circles, Tier 2 is repair harm/conflict circles, and Tier 3 includes mediation, family group conferencing, and welcome/re-entry circles to initiate successful re-integration of students being released from juvenile detention centers.
 
A three-year matched study compared Oakland, CA schools participating in WSRJ to similar schools that did not. In WSRJ schools, suspensions were cut in half (34% to 14%). This was significantly more than the change seen in non-RJ schools (p<.05). Chronic absences diminished in WSRJ middle and high schools, while increasing in non-WSRJ middle and high schools. The middle school differences were highly significant (p<.001). Reading levels for ninth graders increased more in WSRJ schools than in non-WSRJ schools, and four-year graduation rates gained significantly more.

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