Flynn Restorative Practices

Restorative Practices

We aim to teach students what is expected of them and reward them for making Respectful, Responsible and Safe Decisions in order to build community.  However, we recognize that conflicts will occur occasionally and great lessons can be learned from them with guidance and modeling.  Flynn and SFUSD use a Restorative Practice model that includes community circles to build relationships and repair relationships if harms occur. 

What are Restorative Practices?

Restorative practices are based on principles that emphasize the importance of positive relationships as central to building community and involve processes that restore relationships when harm has occurred.

Restorative Practice Principles

The following principles will guide us at Flynn in creating an atmosphere that is respectful, responsible and safe.

  1. Acknowledge that relationships are central to building community
  2. Focuses on the harm done rather than on rule-breaking
  3. Gives voice to the person harmed
  4. Ensures equity of voice amongst all members of the community.
  5. Engages in collaborative problem solving

Paradigm Shift: Relationship Based    

Traditional Approach

Restorative Approach

School and rules violated

People and relationships violated

Justice focuses on establishing guilt

Justice identifies needs and obligations

Accountability=punishment

Accountability=understanding impact, repairing harm

Justice directed at offender, victim ignored

Offender, victim and school all have direct roles in justice process

Rules and intent outweigh whether outcome is positive/negative

Offender is responsible for harmful behavior, repairing harm and working toward positive outcomes

No opportunity for remorse or amends

Opportunity given for amends and expression of remorse

When responding to conflict, a restorative approach consists of asking the people involved these key question:

  1. What happened, and what were you thinking at the time of the incident?
  2. What have you thought about since?
  3. Who has been affected by what happened, and how?
  4. What about this has been the hardest for you?
  5. What do you think needs to be done to make things as right as possible?

Read more about SFUSD’s approach to Restorative Practices

This page was last updated on June 18, 2019