Restorative Justice Training

In addition to reinforcing well-established restorative justice approaches and disseminating best practices, American Humane advances new models to respond to the changing and emerging needs of many groups — child welfare, juvenile justice and victim assistance communities.

American Humane is experienced in supporting the application of two different restorative justice processes: Restorative Conferencing and Circles.

Restorative Conferencing

Restorative Conferencing has proven to be effective in addressing youth offending with great victim satisfaction and low recidivism rates. During this training, participants will gain practical and theoretical knowledge of restorative justice and learn how to use Restorative Conferencing to address youth offending, attain favorable victim and community outcomes, and reduce the likelihood of reoffending.

Circles

When a community is struck by offending, it is the responsibility of everyone affected to address what happened. Circle is a horizontal process in which all participants have the same rights and obligations. Participants take turns talking about the incident and share how it affected them. They collaboratively decide which steps youths need to take to make amends to victims, family members and the community in a collaborative way. It is an empowering process that deters youth from reoffending while attaining high satisfaction rates from victims and communities.