Teacher struggles, buy-in, & grade level inconsistencies

Abstract

The problem under investigation was the impact of restorative justice on lowering rates of exclusionary discipline among minority populations. The focus was primarily on students in grades K-12. More specifically, targeted groups included African American and Latino students (particularly males), and parents. Student/teacher relationships were addressed. The restorative justice theory was used as the theoretical framework to ground this research study. The four participants included both teachers and administrators and findings showed that teachers struggled with restorative justice implementation. Additionally, lack of teacher buy-in and lack of consistency among teachers negatively impacted successful implementation of restorative justice. Future practice should be focused on teacher training in restorative justice, creation of a restorative justice handbook, teacher turnover and adult culture, and student engagement. Future research should be targeted on schools using additional behavior intervention strategies that work well with restorative justice for students with disabilities and incorporating Culturally Relevant Classrooms (CRC) to maximize the impact of restorative justice and student learning time. Keywords: race, discipline, teacher/student relationship, exclusionary discipline, restorative justice--Author's abstract