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What Are Restorative Practices?

Restorative practices are practices learned from the larger Restorative Justice (RJ) movement with the intent of strengthening relationships, building community, and resolving conflict. RJ is a philosophical approach that embraces the principles of inclusion, active accountability, repairing harm, and rebuilding trust. Restorative practices empowers communities through collaborative and collective decision-making.

Restorative Practices for Faculty

The circle process is a facilitated dialogue through which participants share and reflect upon their experiences as they relate to a topic or issue. Participants are seated in a circle and respond sequentially to questions prompted by a facilitator or facilitators. The circle differs from traditional discussions or conversations within groups by providing each participant the opportunity to speak uninterrupted. While one person is speaking, other participants are encouraged to listen deeply. The process begins with a focus on building connections between participants before moving onto topic-driven dialogue. The process also serves to clarify context and intent related to participants' experiences and perspectives, thus avoiding the misunderstandings and assumptions that often arise in unstructured conversation.

Faculty Relations offers restorative circles to build and strengthen relationships, address conflict and harm, and support faculty reconnecting to their department/unit after an absence (such as a sabbatical or another form of extended leave). These different kinds of circles include the following:

• Community-Building Circles provide opportunities for connection with colleagues and creative thinking about unit culture.
• Department/Unit Concern Circles are for reflection on topics or events that are of concern to participants.
• Restorative Conferences provide opportunities for directly resolving and reconciling interpersonal conflict that has resulted in harm to one or more individuals. Restorative conferences provide an opportunity for the person who caused harm to take responsibility and apologize for their actions and allow the person or persons harmed or impacted by this behavior to share how they were impacted. All conference participants work collaboratively to identify and agree upon the harms and their impacts. They collaborate to create an agreement with active participation from the responsible faculty member on how they will repair these harms or impacts. This agreement includes actions that are measurable, specific, and attentive to the identified harms or impacts.
• Reconnection Circles work to welcome back a faculty or staff member who has been away from some or all of their responsibilities at the university, whether through family or medical leave, administrative leave, or for another reason, and to explore how the participants might support this faculty member as they return to the community.

In addition to facilitating the above circles, Faculty Relations provides training to faculty leaders who are interested in running community-building circles within their units.

Restorative Justice at ÃÛÌÒ´«Ã½Æƽâ°æÏÂÔØ

Restorative Justice has been a part of Student Conduct and Conflict Resolution for almost thirty years through the CU Restorative Justice program (CURJ). CURJ is the longest-running student higher education restorative justice program in the country. The Office of Institutional Equity and Compliance also uses Restorative Justice in certain, well-defined student conduct cases. Our office brings this work to faculty.

Contact Us

Faculty Relations is here to help. or contact FacultyRelations@Colorado.EDU if you are considering:

• Scheduling a workshop on how to run a Community-Building Circle in your department or unit,
• Scheduling a Concern Circle or Connection Circle,
• If a Restorative Justice Conference is appropriate for repairing harm in your department or unit.

Examples courtesy of University of San Diego (USD) Center for Restorative Justice.