Becoming Peacemakers: Creating Just Relationships in our Schools.

Source: (2004) Calgary, AB: Deep Humanity Institute.

The purpose of this manual, according to authors Meredith Egan and Marc Forget, is to serve educators, parents, students, and other community members who are interested in changing the way conflict and violence are addressed in schools and their communities. It is not a complete, ready-to-use tool enabling a person to begin facilitating restorative programs or responses. Appropriate training and apprenticeship are required for that. It is, however, a tool for generating dialogue about and action toward creating fundamental change in handling school conflict and violence. The manual consists of the following sections: an introduction to a restorative approach in school settings; the foundations of the work of the Deep Humanity Institute; descriptions of the Project Planet Peace and Becoming CircleKeepers programs in schools in Calgary, Alberta, Canada; and several appendices (a resource list, the restorative model, facilitating transformation, evaluation of Project Planet Peace, and personal reflections on restorative family relationships). Throughout are stories, illustrations, and exercises dealing with actual people and real situations in terms of restorative responses to conflict.