Nicola Preston wears many hats, but they all involve restorative practices. She's a lecturer at the IIRP teaching online courses and a special education needs coordinator for a UK primary (elementary) school. She says that restorative practices have even made a big impact in her personal and family life.

Natalie Medina, an actor who also teaches theater to youth in Panama with Fundación Amaneceres, discusses why kids like the combination of theater and circles, the importance of the talking piece and a play young refugees developed inspired during a circle discussion.

In this short video segment, Les Davey, chief executive of IIRP Europe, discusses work his organization has done in Ireland with victims of sexual abuse by clergy. Sexual abuse cases require careful handling, but they can be powerful experiences, especially for victims. In this video Davey describes one example of the positive effects a conference had for a victim of abuse, who was finally able to sleep well after the restorative meeting. Davey has recently been approached to run a restorative conference for a child in England who was abused in her home at a young age by an ex-boyfriend of her mother.

Watch the short video, "Restorative responses to sexual abuse by clergy," at youtube.

Schools

• California’s Fix School Discipline, a project of Public Counsel, encourages schools in California to address school climate in their newly required Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAP). In a recent blog post counting down to the July 1 deadline, they praise Fresno schools:

Restorative Practices, the critical alternative to suspension in Fresno, is used to build a sense of school community and resolve conflict by repairing harm and restoring positive relationships through the use of regular ‘restorative circles’ where students and educators work together to set academic goals, develop core values for the classroom community and resolve conflicts.

Cody Gates and his father, Gordy Gates, discuss the impact of a restorative conference after Cody set off fireworks into a crowd, from a video presentation sponsored by Easter Seals / Goodwill of the Northwest (watch below).There’s a restorative revolution taking place across the U.S. state of Idaho, originating in the field of juvenile justice and radiating out to schools and communities. It began a few years ago and is being driven by a mostly rural eight-county district in south central Idaho.

Judge Mark Ingram, a magistrate court judge for the Fifth Judicial District in Idaho, was exposed to restorative practices while practicing law 12 years ago. He worked with various kinds of mediation, beginning with personal injury but leaning more toward child custody and victim-offender mediation because they were “more relational,” he said. When he became a judge in his hometown of Shoshone, the Lincoln County seat, with a population of about 1,500, he began to look for ways to help resolve tensions in the community between old-time farmers and new transplants. A Community Justice Coalition with a restorative mission organized large community meetings to foster helpful discussions. But Ingram continued to struggle with the question of how to bring a restorative spirit into the court system in a practical way.

Restorative practices is about helping people have the "right conversation" so they can work through conflict and build relationships, says restorative practices pioneer Terry O'Connell, director of Real Justice Australia (iirp.edu/au).

In the first part of this short video, he talks about his work with young students who learn in school how to frame that conversation, even when they go home and have problems with their friends.

In the following video, filmed at the IIRP's 16th World Conference in October 2013 during a plenary panel on Restorative Practices in the Faith Community, IIRP master's candidate Tom Albright discusses Ripple, the ministry he has helped create based on restorative practices and principles.

View a video of Tom Albright wearing another hat, a teacher working in a school-to-work transition program at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania's, Freedom High School.

Emmanuel Zayas received a 2014 "Yes I Can" Award from the Council for Exceptional Children.Emmanuel Zayas – Manny – a senior at Freedom High School, recently received a Council for Exceptional Children's 2014 Yes I Can Award for his success transitioning from school to work.

Manny's emotional support case manager, Deanna Webb, has worked with him since he was in seventh grade and attests to the great progress he has made. She said, "Manny's emotional intelligence has really increased. He sees how his behaviors have affected others. He's now a leader with his peers."

Tom Albright, who offers career counseling and job placement and coordinates a school-to-work transition program at Freedom, has worked extensively with Manny, his family and his employer over the past year. Albright said that when Manny first joined his class, he was reluctant to get involved in the restorative circles that Albright employs to engage is students in helping each other deal with issues they're facing in school, at home and at work. (In the video, Manny refers to the "fishbowl," a special type of circle that can be useful for problem-solving.)

Peel School District in Ontario, Canada, demonstrates how restorative practices can be used as an integral part of teaching and learning.

The following article discusses two 2013 symposia, one held in the town of Cobourg in southern Ontario, Canada, another in Thunder Bay in the northern part of the province, both funded by the Ontario Ministry of Education to develop restorative practices in schools and the community. Bruce Schenk, director of IIRP Canada said, “Restorative practices is not just being done by a school board [district] here and there, but is a potentially recognized and supported approach right across the province.” RP is not confined to Ontario. In a companion piece, an elementary school teacher in British Columbia on the west coast of Canada, who recently attended an IIRP Canada professional development event near Vancouver, describes the specific ways she uses restorative practices in her classrooom.

Les Davey, CEO IIRP EuropeWith nearly 20 years experience in the UK and Ireland plus affiliates and associates throughout Europe, IIRP Europe (formerly IIRP UK & Ireland) is poised to increase offerings across the continent for training, graduate education and research into restorative practices.

IIRP Europe CEO Les Davey said, "Working with our colleague Vidia Negrea in Hungary (IIRP Europe, Director for Central Europe), we are looking to bring together existing associates of the IIRP in Sweden, the Netherlands, the UK and Ireland, plus new colleagues we’re starting to develop relationships with elsewhere in Europe, in such a way that people can go to one source to find out what restorative practices is about and what’s available in their area."

Henry McClendon, a pastor, program officer with the Skillman Foundation and IIRP licensed trainer and board member, delivered this talk at the IIRP's 16th World Conference in October, 2013, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA.

This video includes the entire plenary session from day three of the IIRP’s 16th World Conference on the topic of restorative practices in faith communities. Bruce Schenk, director of IIRP Canada, moderated the panel. The panelists included:

It's great to see more and more TedX talks tackling issues of restorative practices from a variety of perspectives. Here's a recent talk given by Symeon Brown at TedX Southwark in the UK. According to his bio, "Symeon has worked at the Howard League for Penal Reform with young men and women in custody, founded a grassroots youth project HYPE and was the senior researcher of the Guardian and London School of Economics investigation into the England riots."

Symeon begins his talk by looking at crime in terms of Saturday morning comics (which everyone loves!) but then turns to the topic of "Who are the real bad guys in Britain's jails?" He says that the vast majority are children, mentally ill and people who were formerly in the "carer" or social welfare system.

IIRP President Ted Wachtel spoke at a restorative justice conference at Utah Valley University in autumn 2012, and the talk has been posted on youtube. Wachtel speaks informally for the first few minutes about his personal journey that led him to start schools to help at-risk youth improve their behavior. In his prepared talk, which starts at minute seven, he interweaves powerful stories of restorative conferences and research results to illustrate a variety of basic restorative practices concepts. Parts of this talk essentially are a "reading" from Wachtel's new book, Dreaming of a New Reality.

See the video at youtube.

The Family Group Conference or FGC (known as Family Group Decision Making or FGDM in North America) is a restorative practice that involves extended family, and sometimes close friends and community, in a process of solution-focused problem-solving.

Natalie DeFreitas, a mental health counselor and restorative justice advocate, delivers a great talk on restorative justice at TedXVancouver from 2012.

There are so many lovely short videos now that demonstrate restorative approaches in schools. This one features the voices of many students as well as staff and administrators at two schools in Greater London.

Here's a five-minute "teaser" for a forthcoming documentary from Teachers Unite titled Growing Fairness. The first part of the trailer offers a critique of the so-called school-to-prison pipeline and zero tolerance policies.

This beautifully animated short film walks through a Family Group Decision Making conference (FGDM, also known as a Family Group Conference) from the point of view of a mother at risk of losing her children.

Norwegian Directorate for Children, Youth and Family Affairs (Bufdir) is the Norwegian governmental office for the welfare and protection of children and families.

This video is also available in Norwegian and Russian.

Watch a similar video about family group conferences from a child's perspective.

Find information about IIRP's Family Power program.