Restorative Justice: A Model of School Violence Prevention

Abstract

Restorative Justice (RJ) represents a holistic and humane alternative to punitive measures traditionally used in schools. The goal of RJ is to bring affected parties together following a conflict in order to identify a shared solution for reparation of damages. RJ has demonstrated effectiveness in reducing recidivism and improving community relations. The objective of the present study was to identify elements of RJ in middle school programs and curricula in Mexico. A documentary study was developed and implemented using a checklist as the primary data-collecting instrument. Results indicate the presence of some RJ principles in the curriculum of middle schools in Mexico. The findings suggest that while the principles of RJ are taught, essential components of RJ and school democratization are lacking, such as active student participation in conflict resolution and rule elaboration and school organization.

Forgiveness and Loneliness in Peer-Victimized Adolescents

“…From these results, it seems that due to their feelings of loneliness and isolation, victims might perceive revenge as quite ineffective because, in the absence of support, they fear possible reprisals (Randa & Reyns, 2014;Randa et al, 2019). We believe that these results could also be linked to the way in which adolescents interpret benevolence and attributions of restorative justice (Barcaccia et al, 2017;Frias-Armentia, Rodríguez-Macías, Corral-Verdugo, Caso-Niebla, & García-Arizmendi, 2019). In other words, in a situation of recurrent peer victimization, far from trying to maintain a positive relationship, adolescents choose to avoid social interactions with their aggressors, likely aggravating their isolation.…”

Development and Validation of Two Questionnaires to Study the Perception of Conflict in Physical Education

“…The results presented in this article suggest that students can offer their perception about the causes that generate MC, about the conflicting responses derived from the previous stimulus, or even about both actions. These contributions will help PE students and teachers to educate interpersonal relationships, promoting the development of social skills—that is to say, the constructive transformation of conflict situations [ 23 , 29 , 30 ] and overcoming the difficulties that cause the emergence of interpersonal conflicts [ 6 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 ].…”

“…In practice, school coexistence presents difficulties that disturb the school climate [ 6 , 25 , 26 ]—a fact that causes interpersonal conflicts’ emergence [ 27 , 28 ]. This reality opens a path towards education on interpersonal relationships in favour of growth in social competencies that help students with constructive conflict transformation [ 23 , 29 , 30 ].…”

School Bullying in Compulsory and Advanced Secondary Education. Determining Factors in its Intervention

“…Jointly, attention must be given to the tools learned by students to overcome the conflicts that arise in daily life and used to detect if these approaches can be improved using conflict resolution techniques based on relationship improvement [43,44].…”