Thursday, August 5, 2004

9–10:20 a.m.

Opening Ritual: Art Shofley, Ojibway elder

Speakers:

• Paul McCold, In Pursuit of Paradigm: A Theory of Restorative Justice
• Ted Wachtel, From Restorative Justice to Restorative Practices: Expanding the Paradigm

Featured Video: Family Voices

10:30–11:50 a.m.

Beyond Lawbreaking: Restorative Justice and the Role of the Community
Alana Abramson

There seems to be consensus that community is an important and fundamental part of restorative justice. In order to bring about a paradigm shift, ensure sustainability of restorative responses and address issues of social justice, community must be engaged in a meaningful way. This session will be an opportunity to talk about the values of restorative justice and how these can guide us to meaningful engagement and involvement with community. The session will provide a safe space to share ideas of how to engage with community in a meaningful way. It will include opening and closing circles, a short presentation on the presenter's learnings about this topic from her community, and a small-group exercise to explore the role of community in restorative processes.

Building Community Service Opportunities: Tools for Repairing Harm, Restoring Relationships and Rebuilding Community
Nellie Taylor

Participants will engage in facilitated networking with offenders, nonprofits and public-service agencies to uncover strategies for building community service opportunities consistent with the philosophy of restorative justice. Key issues to be addressed include: how victim concerns are appropriately integrated into the strategy for restoration; when volunteer work isn't voluntary; working with the business community; partnering with nonprofits; mentoring unlikely volunteers; and issues with liability and insurance.

Building Pathways to Personal Restoration: Gang Intervention Work
Molly Baldwin

Gang intervention work has often focused on the dissolution of the gang. The difficulties experienced around sustaining successful intervention strategies with active gang members has to do primarily with a lack of alternative relationships, meaningful work and educational opportunities, and the basic human needs of connection, friendship and cultural mirroring. Through this presentation, we will explore ways in which these difficulties can be addressed by using the work of Roca, Inc.'s street workers as a case study.

Conversation with Paul McCold

This is an opportunity to meet with Paul McCold and have a follow-up conversation on his featured presentation.

Evaluating the Victim Component of Restorative Resolutions
Lana Maloney and Michelle Joubert

The victim component is a unique feature of the Restorative Resolutions program, in Winnipeg, Manitoba. This session will provide information from an evaluation that asks the following questions:
1. What needs do victims have?
2. Are victims who participate in the Restorative Resolutions program more satisfied than victims who do not participate in the Restorative Resolutions program?
3. Is the degree of participation in the Restorative Resolutions program linked to the rate of victim satisfaction?

The evaluation consisted of surveys mailed to victims who participated in Restorative Resolutions and victims who did not have an opportunity to participate in the program. This group of victims was identified from the Winnipeg Police Service's victim services database.

Family Group Conference: Building Alliances Through Relationships
Margaret Koch

Family group conferencing is a new practice approach in British Columbia to work with families who are involved in the child protection system. This session will talk about shifting the power of decision making back to families, and how through this shift family participants can identify what they need to keep their children safe. The philosophy of FGC values the expertise and wisdom of the family to generate safe family plans that protect and nurture children and youth, and this is a model that is used worldwide. The session will include a discussion of the FGC program on Vancouver Island and the experiences of partnering with community and Aboriginal agencies in the delivery of this program, as well as a discussion period with the participants.

Restorative Justice and Healing in a Federal Prison for Women
Reno Guimond

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

In a prison setting the need to deal with guilt and shame is very important. This session will address, in part, how these feelings are addressed with the perpetrators to allow them to begin the healing process. Many women in prison have been victims as well as perpetrators. This session will address how to work with individuals who have been both. The presenter will share anecdotal experiences in a prison setting. In addition, using the medium of music, participants will address the question, Why practice restorative justice?

Restorative Justice as Storytelling
Lana Leonard and Kay Pranis

Participants will learn about the power of storytelling in restorative justice. They will experience how stories teach without preaching, and how personal storytelling is a formidable communication tool that can build relationships, be disarming, and get past resistance and anger and into the heart. They will be introduced to the healing power of telling and listening to stories. Participants will learn how to "story" and experience, get "the whole story" from others, and use mythical stories to set the tone, punctuate and create sacred space in the peacemaking process.

Sexual Offense Conferencing: A South Australian Practice Perspective and the Australian Juvenile Justice Conferencing Context
Grant Thomas and Marnie Doig

Australia comprises six state and two territorial jurisdictions. Since 1991 each of the states and territories has developed its own separate conferencing model to bring together young offenders, their victims and communities as part of a juvenile justice strategy. This session will examine some of the differences between the various Australian conferencing models from a South Australian perspective. Particular focus will be upon divergence in the capacity to conference cases of sexual offending. Practices adopted in South Australia, where sexual offences are conferenced, and current research regarding this area will be analyzed in light of 10 years experience.

Transforming School Culture: One Classroom at a Time
Constance Fenton

This workshop will examine the school-based application of circles and other restorative practices, as well applications of restorative practices in youth courts. Transforming a school culture in recognition that the school is a community is more necessary than ever before. Many schools in the USA are experiencing budgetary constraints and increasing episodes of violence. Using restorative practices proactively can be a viable method of creating a more functional, caring and responsive community. Additionally, the concepts and demonstrations fit in well with school curricula on the indigenous people of North America and on the high-school level in criminal justice classes. The restorative practices continuum is also a viable topic for youth court training programs.

Writing Good Agreements
Beverly Title and Summer Deaton

This workshop is specifically designed for restorative justice facilitators who use any restorative justice model that results in a contract or agreement. This interactive session will give participants a clear understanding of what constitutes a good agreement and further develop ability to craft good agreements. Participants will engage in activities to practice agreement-writing skills and have the opportunity to interact with trainers who have real-life experience in writing and monitoring agreements.

1:30–2:50 p.m.    top of page

Court-Ordered Conferencing in British Columbia
Doug Hillian

Related Document (Adobe PDF)

This presentation will outline the court's response during the first year of British Columbia's provision of restorative conferencing as an option for judges at the sentencing stage in youth court, as part of the 2003 Youth Criminal Justice Act. Highlights include data on the number of conferences, offense types and outcomes, as well as successes, challenges and dilemmas, such as the relationship between the government and the community in provision of services.

Developing a Restorative Response to Juvenile Delinquency in Missouri: One Court at a Time
Joanne Katz and Sandra Rempe

While funded legislative mandates regarding the implementation of restorative justice in the state juvenile court system is optimum, there are other avenues which have proven very successful. In Missouri, by channeling Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) funds into a statewide report, which explained restorative justice and calmed the fears of the courts about issues of confidentiality, more courts became interested in utilizing existing resources to implement restorative justice programming. In response, the OJJDP funds were again tapped for statewide training of existing court personnel, and restorative justice programming is happening throughout the state.

Expanding the Restorative Circle: A Collaborative Approach to Addressing Crimes of Violence in a Tri-Cultural Community
Thom Allena and Peggy Nelson

In the past several years, Taos County, New Mexico, has experienced a significant growth in violent crime as a result of increased drug- and gang-related activity, including a number of shooting deaths. This workshop will describe two of the restorative practices employed to address a shooting death and a vehicular manslaughter incident. We will explore the process of planning, facilitating and the outcomes of community justice circles of these two restorative practices with a particular focus on involving community members in the decision-making process in violent cases. The session will also address the impact of using restorative practices within the Hispanic, Native American and Anglo communities, the primary cultures that comprise the tri-cultural community of Taos. Participants will also assess how they might expand the use of restorative practices in their own communities of practice.

Healing Spirit Curriculum
Susan Morse and Karen Burzette

This session introduces a curriculum for mediation, conflict resolution and anger management. It is user friendly and combines the principles of resiliency with the concepts of restorative justice and the ideas from the novel Touching Spirit Bear by Ben Mikaelsen (a book about anger and the inner need for peace).

Importance of Relationships to Restorative Justice
Randy Munro, Violet Smith, Shawna Baher, Lewis Stone, Anne Thuveson, Mike Carey, Terry Warren and Sherry Elwood

This session will introduce partners working within the Nanaimo Restorative Justice Process. Representation will be from the school district, retail loss prevention, an RCMP school liaison officer, youth probation worker, program coordinators and possibly a youth court judge. It is an opportunity to hear how relationships are key in making a program like restorative justice grow and give it sustenance. Nanaimo Restorative Justice was established on June 1, 1998, and in 2004 the program will have received over 1,000 referrals. This would not have been accomplished without strong relationships within the community.

Restorative Practices in a Closed-Custody Youth Facility: Brookside Youth Centre, Cobourg, Ontario
Bruce Schenk, Michael Maguire and Ron Cameron

In 1999 Brookside Youth Centre, a secure-custody facility for youth in Ontario, piloted the use of family group conferencing. This workshop will provide an overview of the development of restorative practices at Brookside since then, resulting in the incorporation of conferencing and other restorative approaches as the primary approach in addressing all peer-on-peer conflict since August 2003. This workshop will also provide a practical overview of the philosophy, policies and procedures, as well as suggestions for utilizing conferencing and restorative approaches in a correctional facility for youth. Plans about expanding Brookside's use of restorative measures, especially in adhering to the philosophy and mandate of the new Youth Criminal Justice Act and in the area of reintegration, will be included in the presentation and discussion.

Sensitive Collaboration: Involving Women's Organizations in Restorative Justice Programming
Pamela Rubin

Nova Scotia has moved from excluding women's organizations from government development of initiatives to collaboratively working with them as partners. In 1998 the Nova Scotia government introduced the idea of restorative justice referrals for cases involving domestic violence and sex offenses without consulting women's organizations, leading to their alienation and oppositional concern. Six years later this situation has been turned around and collaborative work is moving forward. The key steps in this turnaround involved addressing gender analysis and women's safety and fairness issues in restorative justice programming, by creating innovative collaborative pathways for justice professionals and women's organizations to work together to design and implement restorative justice programming. Opportunities exist at all stages of development and implementation to engage collaboratively as partners, including identifying needs, creating new models, and monitoring and evaluation.

Systematic Change: The Fresno Model
Phil Kader

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

This session explores how systemic change from retributive to restorative justice has been initiated in Fresno County, California, through the creation of the Restorative Justice Framework for Fresno County. The authors and change agents behind the framework will walk participants through the framework document and discuss the Fresno experience with systemic change toward restorative justice. This workshop is presented as one possible model for community-wide adoption of restorative justice.

The Challenge of Integrating Restorative Practice in School Communities
Terry O'Connell

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

This workshop examines how a number of Australian schools have begun to integrate restorative practice as the foundational basis for relationship building. Restorative practice will be explained as an explicit set of relational practices, that are underpinned by sound theories and easily understood by teachers, students and parents. This practice is the essence of sound pedagogy (teaching) and provides teachers with a sound framework for reflective practice. This experience involves students and parents now adopting restorative language and practice with one another.

Time Together: A Restorative Justice Approach to Families of Offenders
Lloyd Withers

This workshop will provide an analysis of a restorative justice and harm-reduction project for federally-sentenced male offenders and their families at Millhaven Assessment Unit, Correctional Service of Canada. The demonstration project is operated by the Canadian Families and Corrections Network and is one recommendation in the CFCN's recently released "A Strategic Approach and Policy Document to Address the Needs of Families of Offenders." The workshop will describe how restorative justice principles are introduced within the institutional orientation process, together with a discussion of preliminary findings and policy implications arising from the demonstration project. Participants will be provided with sample orientation material.

Transformation at the Base: Building Organizations to Restore the World
Molly Baldwin

This session will survey the critical steps in the process of rebuilding organizations from the inside out with the purpose of establishing restorative justice practices, namely the practice of peacemaking circles, at the core of the organizational fabric. Over the past four years, Roca, Inc. has been undergoing a process of realignment with its vision, mission and values. Peacemaking circles have been utilized to help build an internal organizational fabric that supports this process of realignment. This process has strengthened a variety of partnerships across sectors and has increased our capacity as a community to build peace.

3–4:20 p.m.    top of page

Building Blocks for a Restorative School
Joan Fiene and Michelle Tubbs

This interactive session will share information, stories and data from one school system in northern Colorado that implemented community group conferencing, family group decision making and peace circles in response to crisis intervention, student conflict, truancy prevention and intervention, in-house suspension, out-of-school suspension, the expulsion process, the reintegration of out-of-school youth and school/family issues. Participants will also review a logic-model planning process to engage community stakeholders, the issue of sustainability (including grant writing tips and availability), the need for "educational evaluation" components and the "be carefuls."

Circles for Family-Based Interventions with Child Welfare Institutions
Molly Baldwin

This session will focus on the need for innovative, integrated family-based interventions in response to child abuse, neglect and trauma. A new project of Roca, Inc., developed in partnership with the Massachusetts Department of Social Services, will be utilized as a working case study and a catalyst in this conversation.

Circles of Support and Accountability: Building Community Alliances in High-Risk Settings for Safety, Healing and Peacemaking
Andrew McWhinnie, Ben Anderson, Robert Brown, Robin Wilson and David Griffiths

Restorative practice is a continuum of responses to the harm created by crime. Communities fear the return of a sex offender from prison. Circles of Support and Accountability (CoSAs) involve volunteers working to ensure the needs of victims, offenders and community are met, healing space is created, and community peace is restored. Our interactive discussion will highlight ways community members, corrections and law enforcement have transcended professional and governmental boundaries to effect safety (no more victims), healing and the restoration of peace. Panel members will include CoSAs volunteers, and members of the corrections and the law enforcement communities.

Community Conferencing in a Large American Inner City: Multisector Successes in Juvenile Justice, Schools and Neighborhoods
Lauren Abramson and Nel Andrews

Over 5,000 Baltimore inner-city residents have participated in justice, school or neighborhood conferences over the past five years, with over 98 percent of the community conferences resulting in agreements. Since Baltimore is ranked the second most violent city in America, the success of conferencing in this context underscores the reality that conferencing is appropriate for human beings who are in conflict, and should not be limited where or to whom it is offered. Participants will learn how the Community Conferencing Center in Baltimore is structured and how we flexibly use the process. Videotapes of actual conferences will be shown, with group discussion.

Conversation with Ted Wachtel

This is an opportunity to meet with Ted Wachtel and have a follow-up conversation on his featured presentation.

Emotional Formation of the Restorative Justice Practitioner
Jim Radde

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

The practitioner's self-awareness around feelings and needs, the ability to articulate them and continued growth in compassion are critical to the authenticity and effectiveness of restorative justice practices. In this interactive session, a definition of justice will be proposed and its implications for relationships developed. "Emotional literacy" and its indicators will be examined. Curricula will be identified that teach the life skills essential to problem solving, promoting intimacy, preventing violence and living out restorative justice values. As an aid to living out restorative justice values, participants will experiment with new conflict-management tools and techniques they can apply immediately.

Halton Youth Justice Program: Pre-Charge Diversion
Chris Dodds and Susan Moraes

This session will present material on the Halton Youth Justice Program: Pre-Charge Diversion. This is a unique proactive program designed to deal with youth (12 to 17 years old) in conflict with the law. If the youth meets the criteria, he/she may be considered for an alternative to the court process. This program holds youth accountable for their actions while offering an opportunity to deal with the underlying issues contributing to a youth's criminal behavior. The youth face criminal charges for not adhering to the program conditions.

Implementing a Successful Reintegration Through Collaboration
Peter Young

Most of the folks at Peter Young Housing, Industries and Treatment come to us through the criminal justice system. They are addicted and have been punished for their addiction by the system. Many have been sentenced to extremely long prison terms and have been released to us through Honor Court, which will be explained in the presentation. We are firmly committed to the concept of the three-legged stool (our logo)—we treat the addiction (not cure it), we house our folks, and we train them (industries) to return to society as tax-paying citizens. We give them the ongoing support they need to succeed. We give them a resume and restore their dignity. How we do all this through our various industries, housing projects and treatment centers will be explained in detail during the full presentation.

Partnering with Other Restorative Practices
Lois Beaudry and Harriette Manis

Circles and conferences relate to each other, as well as to corrections. They can work together to strengthen communities. Facilitators can accomplish this by learning more about other restorative practices, and partnering with them:
• Facilitators can assess the needs of the participants and, if appropriate, refer to other processes.
• Facilitators can adapt the current process to meet the needs of the participants,
• Facilitators can present an atmosphere to guide participants toward creative restitution agreements.
• Facilitators can help victims to achieve some satisfaction when their offenders decline participation.
• Facilitators can help offenders to repair the harm when their victims decline participation.

Restorative Justice Problem Solving for Student Leaders in the School Setting
Maurizio Vespa and Anthony Leon

As part of a whole-school approach to restorative practices, Marist Youth Care in New South Wales, Australia, offers a student-leadership program. Students are taught the foundational skills of active listening, paraphrasing and understanding conflict as a basis for problem solving with junior students in a restorative way. They use a restorative script, which grounds them in the process. This workshop will be highly interactive and will engage participants in a number of activities from the actual program. Participants will have an opportunity to use the script through role-play scenarios.

RESTORE: A Restorative Response to Shoplifting
Perrie McMillen and Bernadette Felix

The RESTORE process, a completely unique response to juvenile shoplifting, allows offenders be accountable for their offence while repairing the harm their actions caused to themselves, their families and their community. The large number of juvenile shoplifters required streamlining the traditional conference process yet remained true to restorative principles and community involvement. This presentation details the development of this process, highlights the philosophy behind it, provides information on how to implement a similar process in your community and reviews the lessons learned over the past two years and 360 offenders.

Friday, August 6, 2004

10:30–11:50 a.m.    top of page

Speakers:

• Mija Bergman and Annelie Edren, Restorative Practices with Sweden’s Homeless: The Stockholm City Mission
• Rick Hugh and Jenni Lynnea, Restorative Justice in Schools in Surrey, British Columbia

Confessions of a Family Group Conference Coordinator
Sheila Ozeer

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

Family group conferences provide a forum for families to come together to make decisions about the welfare of their children. This is only made possible, though, if all those involved in the FGC process fulfill their roles toward commitment, encouragement, empowerment and believing in the FGC model. Those involved are social services agencies and service providers, families and adults important to the child(ren), and family group conference coordinators. As well as sharing the presenter's knowledge and experiences of being a family group conference coordinator, the session will look in depth at how important the role of the coordinator is, as they are crucial in the FGC process.

Conversation with Mija Bergman and Annelie Edren
Annelie Edren and Mija Bergman

This is an opportunity to meet with Mija Bergman and Annelie Edren and have a follow-up conversation on their featured presentation.

Conversation with Rick Hugh and Jenni Lynnea
Rick Hugh and Jenni Lynnea

This is an opportunity to meet with Rick Hugh and Jenni Lynnea and have a follow-up conversation on their featured presentation.

Effective Communication in Restorative Justice Conferencing
Ron Hunt

Effective communication is essential in developing the best opportunities for resolution and healing in restorative justice conferences. Using the linguist Roman Jakobson's tool of six main factors and functions in a communication event, this session will invite participants to reflect upon and share insights into the context, message, addresser and addressee motives, and the contact and code of messages communicated during conferences. These factors and functions often lay behind and below the formal scripted conferencing process. Being aware of the subtle meanings within the communication framework of the conference itself will assist those conducting conferences and those taking part in conferences to better appreciate and understand the communication of participants. This session will include a brief explanation of Jakobson's approach as it applies to restorative conferences. Participants will have an opportunity to ask questions and share their own experience and insights. It will be a lively, interactive learning event.

From Risk to Resilience
Julia Fassina

The session will discuss an "early intervention" strategy that has been adopted by schools within Tasmania, based on the research that young people who are resilient are least likely to engage in risky behaviors. The main focus in schools has been to build the resilience of students and the capacity of school communities to make a real difference in the lives of young people across a wide range of health outcomes, such as drug use, sex, mental health, self-harm, bullying, violence and eating disorders. Examples of school community programs and initiatives that have had significant impact will be showcased.

Reality Speaking Life Skills Program
Heather Lewis

Reality Speaking bridges the gap between training received at home and the traditional academic training presented in school. The program's nine workshops and two workbooks teach students critical thinking skills, empathy, goal setting, problem solving and other techniques to form positive relationships and grow into productive adults. Educators and policy makers experiencing a Reality Speaking presentation will be challenged to think beyond their own traditional training and be open to new and innovative means of communicating and educating today's youth.

Restitution as a Restorative Process: Using Family Conferencing to Return to the School Community Strengthened
Rose MacKenzie

Restitution, an approach developed by Diane Gossen, can be used in conjunction with the family conference process to assist individuals in becoming more effective managers of their own behavior by learning to make responsible, need-fulfilling choices that result in constructive, successful behaviors. Participants will leave this session with information and questions that can be used during the conference process that reflect restitution beliefs. Individuals will come out of a conference strengthened and on their way in becoming the people they are capable of being. The approach has been used with great success in a variety of school settings.

Restorative Justice in Nova Scotia: Collaborative Dialogue on Concerns Regarding Restorative Processes in Response to Partner Violence and Sexual Offenses Against Women
Pat Gorham and Pamela Rubin

The Women's Restorative Justice Research Committee, a coalition of equality-seeking women's organizations in Nova Scotia, undertook a research project to gather and report on the issues of concern to women in Nova Scotia regarding the potential use of restorative justice processes in response to partner violence and sexual offenses. The research and resulting report has been the catalyst for a new approach to the exploration of these concerns. Workshop participants will learn about the approach and the challenges encountered and gains made in developing this collaborative model, and have an opportunity to explore how to respond to issues challenging restorative justice in this context, including physical and psychological safety, ensuring depth and meaning to the concept of voluntariness, the meaning of community support in the context of these harms, and systemic issues impinging on the development of a victim-centered approach.

RJ City^SM: Comtemplating a Restorative Justice System
Daniel Van Ness

RJ City^SM is a research and development project to design a model restorative justice system capable of handling all cases, all offenders and all victims. What would such a justice system look like, and how would it implement and sustain restorative values? The project is nearing completion of its first phase, which is to design and put into writing a model restorative justice system. The international advisory board has included Paul McCold, among other restorative justice experts. This interactive breakout session will begin with an audiovisual overview of RJ City^SM and then move to discussion of assumptions, definitions and possibilities.

The Restorative Use of Language: The Voice of a Developing Consciousness and a Signal of a Deeper Restorative Awareness Seeking Common Ground
Kris Gibson

This session will introduce the restorative use of language to be applied to our restorative justice practices. This workshop offers inspiration and specific tools that you may apply immediately. Depending on what your vision for the future is, you can incorporate learning from the workshop and increase your contribution toward peace, justice and restoration within the restorative justice context. Restorative Use of Language: Restorative Communication, is based on Marshall Rosenberg's "nonviolent communication" process. This workshop will mix presentation, discussion and activities. Through exercises, we will practice receiving difficult communications with empathy for another's pain and honestly expressing feelings and needs. Restorative justice is not "soft," nor is the development of an awareness that consistently demonstrates our skills and abilities to repair harm, to restore ourselves and contribute peacefully to others.

Why the Real Justice Script?
Terry O'Connell

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

The Real Justice script is well known to those involved in the restorative justice movement. It appears, however, that many view this script as generally useful but at times inflexible and not suited to all situations. This workshop will not only clarify the script's rationale, but will also show how the script's key restorative questions provide the foundation for a broad set of explicit restorative practices. It will explore the linkages between theory and practice, which will provide a sound insight into how to shift the focus of your practice from a narrow programatic approach around conferences to a much broader set of relational practices.

1:30–2:10 p.m.    top of page

Can No Child Be Left Behind Without Learning to Live?
Cindi Atkinson

This presentation entails a brief description of the United States' No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Although specific to the United States, NCLB parallels the accountability demands emanating from numerous other countries as well. Two Oklahoma teachers will provide brief statistics to demonstrate how schools, homes, detention facilities and society in general often overlook, neglect and leave behind our very hope for the future. Utilizing Jane Roland Martin's Cultural Miseducation as a theoretical source, they will facilitate discussion regarding ways that multiple educational agencies within the community can teach children to live through restorative practices.

Case Studies in Restorative School Discipline
Vidia Negrea and Susan Wachtel

This workshop will focus on the use of restorative strategies and techniques in school settings, drawing on the presenters’ experience running schools for troubled, delinquent and at-risk youth in the USA and Hungary. Topics will include the use of circles, affective questions and other processes from the “restorative practices continuum,” norm building and creating community. The presenters will discuss actual cases and their resolutions.

Conditional Cautioning: A Court Disposal Using Restorative Justice
Joanna Mears

A conditional caution is "a caution which is given in respect of an offence admitted by the offender and which has conditions attached to it." If an offender fails without reasonable excuse to comply with the conditions attached to a conditional caution, the UK Criminal Justice Act of 2003 provides for criminal procedings to be instituted and the condition cancelled. The conditions will have a strong restorative justice element to them. Conditional cautioning enables offenders to be given a suitable disposal without the involvement of the usual court processes. Offenders who would now be eligible for a conditional caution would have previously attended court and received a conditional discharge or a small fine.

Exploring the History of the Restorative Justice Movement
Kelly Richards

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

Considering the recent proliferation of restorative justice programs around the world and the space that restorative justice has come to fill in many criminal justice systems, it is important to understand where the various ideas that inform restorative justice have come from. How is it that restorative justice has come to be an acceptable way of "doing justice"? This session will outline the presenter's Ph.D. research, which aims to address this question using "genealogy," a method of historical inquiry promoted by philosopher-historian Michel Foucault. It will thus explore a number of broad areas that have precipitated the emergence of restorative justice practices.

Family Decision Making in Child Protection and the Legal Context in South Australia
Donnie Martin and Patrine Baptist

This session will examine the influence of legislation on family decision making, with particular reference to the Family Care Meeting program mandated by the South Australian Children's Protection Act 1993. The strengths and weaknesses of the legislation will be considered in relation to the effectiveness of the program in providing opportunities for genuine family empowerment. Some comparisons will be drawn to other similar programs that operate under different legislation or without any legislative base.

Restorative Justice in Thailand
Kittipong Kittayarak

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

This session will discuss the application and “revival” of the concept of restorative justice in Thailand’s criminal justice system. After exploring traces of restorative justice still visible in some rural Thai communities, the session will outline the current problems facing the Thai criminal justice system, leading to the re-emergence of restorative justice. It will also show the strategies employed by its proponents in successfully bringing the concept of restorative justice back into the mainstream and making it a major part of the agenda for reform. Among the issues discussed will be diversion programs for drug addicts, which have paved the way for many new restorative programs; restorative justice programs initiated in June 2004 in 11 probation offices; proposed restorative programs for domestic violence; and proposed legislation for diversion at the prosecution stage. Models adopted for restorative conferences, as well as some selected case outcomes, will also be introduced.

Restorative Options for Handling Juvenile Offenders
Dennis Wong and Stanislaus D. K. Lai

Based on a study of measures for handling juvenile offenders in six countries (England and Wales, Singapore, Canada, Belgium, New Zealand and Queensland, Australia), this presentation will provide an account of the objectives of the measures, the circumstances in which the measures apply, the groups of persons targeted by the measures, and how the measures operate. It will also explore the emergence of a restorative justice approach to juvenile offending in Hong Kong, China. Areas for collaboration that are likely to enhance the functional linkages between existing youth services, the juvenile justice system and new restorative measures will also be identified.

Restoring the Mind: The Akwesasne Approach to Restoring Balance and harmony in the Mohawk Community
Louise Thompson and Rena Smoke

The presenters will talk about how their program operates when a person commits an act that is contrary to the normal behavior of the community. When a person carries out this behavior, it signifies that the individual's mind is not thinking properly. The Neh Kanikonriio (Good Mind) Council hopes to help that individual to acknowledge the impacts of their behavior and identify the reasons for causing the person to have a bad mind. The process often involves tradtional practices, which are used to assist the person to travel on a healthier path of life.

This session will discuss how restorative practices can be applied effectively in dealing with community members’ complaints against the police, by helping to bridge the traditional gap between the police and the communities they serve.

Youth Justice and Restorative Practice in Scotland
Bill Whyte

This session will examine the application of restorative justice principles within Scotland's children's hearing system, itself intended to replace formal criminal justice processes; the tensions between voluntarism and compulsory measures, and the challenges and opportunities of introducing expectation of reparative activity; and the challenges of providing a central place for victims within a welfare system of justice, while accessing meaningful help for children and families with multiple difficulties.

2:20-3 p.m.    top of page

Developing Practice Standards for Restorative Justice in a Collaborative Dialogue Model
Pat Gorham

The Nova Scotia Restorative Justice Program will share outcomes from their collaborative practice standards development project, and engage participants in further exploration of the challenge of building principled restorative justice practice using a collaborative approach. The approach seeks to accomplish the following:
• honor the expertise of the practicing agencies
• use restorative principles
• develop consensus-based consistency in approach and response to problems
• embrace input from diverse communities
• establish separate guidelines to reference the work of the Aboriginal restorative justice agency, with a focus on Mi'kmaq customary law.

The session will provide attendees with an update on how the process has unfolded, a review of the standard that emerges, the challenges encountered in building principled restorative practice models, and seek input, comment and sharing from attendees as to how these issues have been addressed in their work.

Differential Applications of Restorative Principle and Conferencing in Child Protection and Juvenile Justice in South Australia
Grant Thomas and Patrine Baptist

The Youth Court of South Australia has two teams that apply a restorative conferencing model to the areas of child protection and juvenile justice. The teams share commonalities in philosophy and client group, and these links will be described and explored. It will be demonstrated that early intervention resulting from conferencing in the child protection area may well reduce the later need to apply the model in the area of juvenile justice. The legislative background to the work in South Australia has also resulted in differences in practice between the teams that are influenced by the difference in the focus of each team.

Guatemalan Mayan Law and Restorative Justice
Christina Albo

Mayan law is a whole system of justice rooted in restorative principles such as respect, repairing the harm, involving all affected parties in the process of resolution, accountability, responsibility, forgiveness and reconciliation. Yet the field of restorative justice has not looked to Mayan law for effective processes that could be culturally adaptable to other contexts. This session will explore similarities and differences between Mayan law and restorative justice and discuss possible points of learning for the field of restorative justice, including a values-based approach to restorative justice, community participation and deepening democracy, and the respective roles of a moral authority figure and the victim in the process.

Introducing Restorative Practices in the UK Justice System for Youth Crime
Michael Kearns

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

The session begins by setting the scene of a real burglary of the Crossness Museum on the banks of the River Thames in London, England. A 15-year-old boy was identified as the perpetrator of the crime and was sent to the youth court where he received a referral order to the Youth Offending Team with 12 hours of community reparation. The youth and parent agreed to take part in a restorative justice approach and permission was given for a record to be made of the process. Photographic records were taken over a period of time while the victim took part and reparation was completed, with agreement of all parties making a contribution in showing how damage to all of those concerned in the offending behavior can be addressed in a positive reintegrative process.

Motivating Local Government to Rethink Correctional Practices: A Case Study
Steve Smith

A suburban county near a major midwestern-US city reduced its jail population by over 60 percent without a resulting increase in crime. The presenter, who served as the jail consultant to this county government in the late 1990s, will report on its multi-year process to reduce the jail population through effective management of the incarceration decision process. A jail utilization study was conducted to project the capacity needs for the next 25 years. Major remodeling and a jail addition were planned and constructed. During the three-year construction phase, the county justice system was forced to cut the number of inmates from a daily high of 240 to 90, led by a jail population management committee comprised of local justice officials. The reduction had no impact on the local crime rate, illustrating the unnecessary use of incarceration and supporting the use of more restorative and remedial judicial sentences.

Restorative conferencing is not simply for cases where there is a clear-cut offender and victim. Conferencing is equally effective in addressing more complex situations, involving varying degrees of responsibility among the parties in conflict. Two police veterans will discuss the applicability of restorative conferencing conducted by police in dealing with neighborhood disputes, allowing parties to come to resolution through developing a shared understanding of the situation.

Restorative Justice and International Criminal Justice Reform: A View from Latvia
Johannes Wheeldon

Criminal justice reform forms an integral part of governance reform programming funded by national and international donor agencies around the world. In recent years, those who develop, fund and implement international criminal justice reform programs have become increasingly interested in how the restorative paradigm might inform technical assistance programming in this field. This seminar will explore the complications related to the inclusion of restorative justice as a component of overall technical assistance in the field of criminal justice, and offer some suggestions about how these challenges might be addressed. Focusing on one specific example, the seminar will consider the Latvian Legal Reform Project funded by CIDA and implemented by the Association of Universities and Colleges Canada.

Restorative Practices with Troubled Youth: What Has Worked So Far
Karri Barber

This session will report on the restorative practices that have been implemented within the Wolverine Human Services residential placement programs in Michigan. The restorative justice program within Wolverine Human Services consists of several different modalities, including individual counseling, group counseling, restorative-justice journaling and community-service projects. The program also uses restoration circles to address disruption and disrespect, both between youth and youth and between youth and staff. These circles have addressed behavior both in the classroom and outside of it. The positives that have taken place, as well as some of the stumbling blocks, will be discussed.

This session will explore the application of restorative practices in supervising staff. The presenters will discuss building a supervisory relationship, fostering a restorative culture in the workplace, helping staff take responsibility for their own growth and dealing with difficult employees.

3:10-5 p.m.

Mapping the Restorative Universe:
A Plenary Process to Promote a Global Alliance

• Paper by session facilitators Mark Seidler and Thom Allena
• Gallery of maps created by participants

Saturday, August 7, 2004

10:30–11:50 a.m.    top of page

Plenary Session

Speakers:

• Bonnie George, The Wet’suwet’en Unlocking Aboriginal Justice Program: Restorative Practices in British Columbia, Canada
• Robert van Pagée, Family Group Conferencing as a First Choice: Empowerment Versus Intervention

With a body of knowledge and experience built over 10 years of conferencing in schools in Australia, New Zealand and the UK, Margaret Thorsborne will invite participants to share their own successes and frustrations in their attempts to challenge and change the culture of discipline in schools. In this highly practical workshop, she will share her experience of implementing culture change using examples of successful models currently working in private and public and elementary, intermediate and secondary schools where restorative practices happen where they matter most, in classrooms.

Completing the Circle: Working with Children Under 12
Rick Kelly

Typically in our dealings with children who are younger, we tend to offer less opportunities for accepting responsibility and addressing the consequences of their actions. This session describes implementing a demonstration research project for restorative justice conferencing focusing on children under 12 years old. Areas that will be discussed will be the learning gained from:
• training over 25 professionals and college students
• developing partnerships with two large school boards
• tailoring the model of conferencing for children under 12
• sample experiences from implementing conferences with children from this age group
• future directions.

Conversation with Bonnie George
Bonnie George

This is an opportunity to meet with Bonnie George and have a follow-up conversation on her featured presentation.

Conversation with Robert van Pagée

This is an opportunity to meet with Robert van Pagée and have a follow-up conversation on his featured presentation.

Restorative Justice and the RCMP: Making the Connection
Jim Cooley

This workshop will provide an overview of the RCMP E Division (British Columbia) restorative justice training on Community Justice Forums, by the coordinator of RCMP Restorative Justice. It will include discussion of the 21 classes completed in 2003, a summary of the training agenda, profiles of the E Division trainers, a summary of the participant evaluations from the trainings, and observations from the trainers on how the training was accepted within the communities.

Restorative Justice Practice for the Prevention and Healing of Child Sexual Abuse
Alisa Klein

This workshop will explore how child sexual abuse is an issue of personal, family and societal harm that provides us with a very real-life opportunity to look at how restorative justice can be applied to, and have powerful effects on, a very complex prevention issue. The presenter will share research results that illustrate how the official systems charged with responding to child sexual abuse actually deter prevention of, and impede upon healing from, child sexual abuse, and advocates for the use of restorative justice practice to hold abusers accountable and promote prevention and healing for abusers, survivors, and their families and communities.

Sincere Apology or Shameful Admission?
Jane Pennington

Related document (Adobe PDF file)

Apology is an important aspect for both sides participating in conferences. We cannot force apology from the one who has done harm, yet a key to moving through the conferencing process—or any relationship difficulty—often comes in the form of some kind of apology, demonstration of regret and remorse, seeking forgiveness, or open acknowledgement of harm done. This workshop will look at the nature of apology and its relationship to unresolved shame. Then, particular social-emotive forces will be identified that can lead us to the pathway of reconnection, reconciliation and healing.

1:30–2:10 p.m.    top of page

A Look at BARJ Through a Different Lens: Grantsmanship and Funding—Making it Happen
Roger Kennedy

So you want to develop a Balanced and Restorative Justice (BARJ) program for your agency, but don't have the financial resources to implement the project. Now what? This session will present a brief overview of the funding available through the US Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, with respect to funding for juvenile justice programs. In addition, this presentation will explore some practical and concrete tips for grant-writing and look at some alternative sources of funding for that BARJ project.

An Ontario Perspective: Building Restorative Principles and Practices Into Youth Criminal Justice Act Implementation
Bruce Schenk

As part of Ontario's response to Canada's new Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA), an Interministerial Restorative Justice Working Group was established in the fall of 2003 to begin strategizing how the province can effectively integrate restorative principles and practices into its youth-justice services. The province is currently examining how to increasingly incorporate restorative values and practices into its community-based approaches. This workshop will provide an overview of the work accomplished thus far, including elements of a report outlining the connection between restorative justice and the YCJA. Part of what will be shared is a strategy for the creation of restorative justice principles, values and best-practice guidelines for Ontario. The workshop will include opportunity for input from participants about what has worked in their jurisdictions regarding the development of restorative justice.

Community Accountability Boards: Making a Difference
Tami Kampbell and Janet Francis

The State of Washington Department of Corrections believes that in order to effect changes and impact behavior, there must be collaboration with the community. As a result, Community Accountability Boards were formed. The Community Accountability Boards are comprised of volunteers from the community who want to impact crime by being involved in the decision making regarding offender behavior. The board is based on restorative justice principles and seeks to engage the community and victims with the offender to restore the harm done as a result of the offender's behavior. The Community Accountability Board hears offender violations of supervision and administers agreed-upon intermediate sanctions.

Family and Community Group Conferencing in Thailand
Wanchai Roujanavong and Titaporn Utensute

Thailand's Ministry of Justice has made a lot of progress on family and community group conferencing (FCGC). Restorative justice is in the experimental period in the Thai juvenile justice system, supported by the prime minister. Though still experimental, FCGC is now being used in minor cases throughout the country with fruitful results. The ministry has been organizing and conducting intensive training for selected staff from the department to be efficient FCGC facilitators. As a result, there are roughly 583 cases with non-prosecution orders through the successful FCGC meetings.

Family Conferencing and Residential Childcare: The Irish Perspective
Roger Killeen and Rose Sweeney

The Special Residential Services Board, provided for under Part 11 of the Irish Children Act 2001, was established to coordinate the development of the sector comprised of special care units, detention schools and detention centers for young people. The board endeavors to carry out its functions based on the overriding principles of partnership on behalf of children, and using detention only as a matter of last resort. The Children Act itself also embraces these principles, and in order to facilitate this, the act provides for three types of family conferencing: family welfare conferencing, garda (police) conferencing, and family conferencing run by the Probation and Welfare Service.

Gender Issues for Male Restorative Justice Facilitators
Essrea Cherin and William Bledsoe

Estimates of the fraction of women in the general population that have been abused by men vary, but in the US mostly hover between one quarter and one third. Consequently, any male facilitator might seem suspect (or worse) to some women participants in our restorative justice processes. What can we, male facilitators, do to engender a feeling of safety? Concurrently, this may mean that male restorative justice facilitators are called upon to take a closer look at our own personal attitudes toward women. Restorative justice calls for a community that respects the inherent dignity of each person regardless of gender. What specific actions will get us there?

This session will explore some of the issues and obstacles that face teachers and administrators who are introducing the use of restorative practices in their buildings or districts. An understanding of how people react to change will be presented, as well as some strategies for successful implementation.

The Voice of the Child in Family Decision Making in Child Protection
Donnie Martin and Patrine Baptist

This session will discuss involvement of children and young people in decision making about care and protection arrangements when there is a history of abuse or neglect, and a possible need for an order placing the child in state care. The South Australian Children's Protection Act provides for family care meetings to enable families, including the child or young person concerned, to participate in decision making. If the child cannot or does not wish to attend, a child advocate must be appointed. Arguments for and against involvement of the child and practical resolutions using case examples will be discussed.