Recent Posts
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How Mediation Circles Build Belonging by Helping Students Reconnect with Themselves
A single student-facilitated Mediation Circle, like the one that helped Kai reconnect with himself, shows how belonging grows not from surveys or slogans but from the practiced skill of creating connection.
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The Last Step in the Hiring Process: What Student-Led Community Circles Really Require
A school where students are the last step in the hiring process reveals what it really takes to make student-led community circles more than a program.
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The Tool Behind the Question: How Adults Build the Capacity for Reparation
When an adult trades punishment for curiosity, a student can move from 'I'm in trouble' to 'I can repair this' — and that shift starts with the adult's own choice to connect first.
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The Integrity Check-In: How Adult Vulnerability Builds the Foundation for Student-Led Reparation
Before students can be asked to repair harm, adults must first model the vulnerability of admitting their own missteps—this is the quiet foundation that makes student-led justice possible.
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Why Students Should Have a Vote in Who Gets Hired
When students help decide who teaches at their school, restorative practices stop being a program and become a way of life.
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Why Belonging Begins With Homeostasis: A Tool for Maine Schools
Before students can use restorative tools, they need a state of homeostasis—and that is exactly what intentional belonging practices provide.
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Marcus Didn't Need a Hallway Pass. He Needed a Better Tool.
When a student slams a calculator, the question isn't 'How do I punish this?' but 'What tool was missing—and how do I help build it?'
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Stop Saying 'Stop': How a Simple Shift in Adult Language Unlocks Student Self-Regulation
When a teacher commands a student to stop a behavior, she often triggers defiance—but offering a choice can unlock the student's own self-regulation. Here's how to shift from 'Stop that' to 'What do you need?'
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Taking Marcus's Notebook Turned a Coping Tool Into Classroom Defiance
When a student's 'bad' behavior is just the best tool they have, the adult's job is to offer a better one — not to take the tool away.
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Cameron Kicked a Desk. The Referral Was Not the Repair.
A student’s disruptive behavior is a tool; the question is whether we’ll hand them a better one before they need it again.
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When Students Lead the Circle: Self-Regulation and Structured Prompts Build Community Without Adult Fixing
Building community through restorative circles requires student facilitators who regulate themselves first, then use structured prompts—not adult control—to invite honest participation.
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In Most Restorative Programs, the Adults Are Getting All the Practice
A dean who runs two hundred mediations a year becomes extraordinarily fluent in repair. The students in those mediations get mediated once. Fluency goes to whoever holds the practice, and in most schools that is an adult who already had...
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In Most Restorative Programs, the Adults Are Getting All the Practice
A dean who runs two hundred mediations a year becomes extraordinarily fluent in repair. The students in those mediations get mediated once. Fluency goes to whoever holds the practice, and in most schools that is an adult who already had...
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Jasmine Was Using the Best Tool She Had
She had beaten up two girls on the last day of school, at the same time. We spent the summer teaching her tools, not lessons about why fighting is wrong. The difference between those two approaches is the difference between...
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