Schools told: try restorative justice, not a suspension

SCHOOLS should consider approaches such as restorative justice instead of suspending students for bad behaviour, according to guidelines published yesterday.

They also advise schools not to suspend students for breaching uniform rules or having poor attendance.

The draft guidelines for developing school codes of behaviour will be finalised after public consultations over the coming months and sent to the country’s 4,000 primary and second- level schools in September. The 2000 Education (Welfare) Act requires the board of management of every school to prepare a code of behaviour.

The draft guidelines issued by the National Educational Welfare Board (NEWB) advise schools to use alternative methods to address bad behaviour, such as peer mediation, restorative justice approaches and family conferencing to avoid the risk of unwanted outcomes from suspension. These include a sense of alienation from school leading to a cycle of academic problems that could be hard to break.

Before deciding if suspension is an appropriate response to a student’s behaviour, the schools are also advised to consider the seriousness of the behaviour, interventions tried to date and the possible impacts of suspension.

“School authorities may be faced with the task of weighing the needs of the individual student with the needs of other students. This is a difficult balance, and achieving it will require the application of professional skill and judgment, on a case-by-case basis, drawing on factual and objective information about the impact of a student’s behaviour, and using transparent criteria for measuring that impact,” the guidelines state.

The restorative justice method would involve a meeting between the misbehaving student and the student or teacher affected by their actions.

The system has been piloted in a number of the country’s district courts, allowing judges to recommend an alternative to custody. It provides for the victims of crime to meet with the offender and is believed to benefit offenders as they are confronted with the consequences of their action.

The guidelines point out that in-school suspension used in some schools to allow a student to continue learning outside the classroom setting could also be a useful alternative.

NEWB chief executive Eddie Ward said the guidelines strike a balance between setting strict rules and the need for each school to develop practices best suited to its own circumstances.

“It shouldn’t be a manual used only in crisis situations because if the process of developing behaviour codes is done right, it will provide a learning environment for everybody,” he said.

“Any measure to exclude a student from learning is a very critical step and schools must have a choice of interventions they can make before reaching that stage,” said Mr Ward.