Peer mediation and alternative dispute resolution in schools

ADR -- Facilitating Conflict Between Children: Peer (School) mediation programs

Perspective of Media Source: CNN

Before the shootings at Columbine High School, many parents simply thought of childhood and adolescent bullying as simply a rite of passage, a natural part of growing up, rather than something to be alarmed at. However, according to the popular online media source, CNN.com, an informational news website, President Clinton echoed teachers and therapists that although "we don't know all the facts about what happened in Littleton, but one of the things that have come out of this that's really made an impression on me is that the young men who were involved in this horrible act apparently felt that they were subject to ridicule and ostracism and they were kind of social outcasts at the school. But their reaction to it was to find someone else to look down on." (CNN.com, 1999)

The media source stresses mediation and perhaps peer ADR mediation could have helped. It suggests such mediation should intervene in situations of schoolyard as well as formal settings before a judge in a courtroom. "The students, many of whom worked in the school's conflict resolution program, touted the benefits of peer mediation as a way for people to work out their differences in a respectful atmosphere." (CNN.com, 1999) In other words, although it is no panacea, when properly supervised, and conducted by trained facilitators, proper peer mediation, with an emphasis on alternative dispute resolution, can make childhood a less painful process.

However, the article does not discuss one of the most critical elements of mediation, namely the existence of impartial third party facilitator. Clearly, these boys felt oppressed by their system to the point where they did not believe such impartiality could exist. The president, the peer mediators and students he talked to, nor the teachers could not detail how such impartial facilitators might be derived or trained in a school system the boys saw as hostile and alien.

Teachers, because they often know the students involved in dispute so well, or at very least student reputations even in larger school districts hardly could hardly be characterized as impartial, and impartiality is a key part of ADR. The use of peers might be even more problematic, for no matter how well trained in the facilitation process they are still interested parties, as they are members of the same community as those whom they facilitate. Of course, the ideal solution would be to bring in out-of-school, trained ADR facilitators to mediate between conflicted teens and children, but in a financially strapped school system this might prove problematic.

Comparision of Journal and Media Source

While the popular media source tends to stress that mediation between independent facilitators and conflicted parties can have good consequences for schools and society overall, the journal article uses statistical evidence to show that a targeted population is most at risk for falling into violent behavior. Rather than using words and broad labels such as "moral values" to suggest mediation and communication in the schools are vaguely positive things, the journal article suggests that although conventional and contemporary methods are simply not working in terms of dealing with conflict, this does not all mean that all students are equally at risk for criminality and violence.

The journal, stresses that a predisposition to violent behavior is not simply a symptom of being ostracized or angry. Effective conflict resolution requires level of trust the participants may not have the cognitive skills to bestow upon others for a variety of reasons. "According to this perspective, child neuropsychological deficits and temperamental difficulty from birth can lead to excessive impulsivity and problems with emotional control during the preschool years." (2) The article does not deny the positive effects of mediation. "The goal of the Fast Track Program was to reduce long-term conduct problems by means of interventions that addressed significant mediators of this pathogenic process. In the first report of the impact of the intervention (CPPRG, 1999), significant effects on most of the mediators of this development were realized." But this was a result of a mediation program that targeted at-risk, impulsive and potentially violent youths whom were idenitified early on in their academic careers.

Another problem of the use of mediation training and the use of ADR itself in schools, is that -- like the external cues that show a potential predisposition to violence and the positive or beneificial aspects of mediating students -- all such observed gagues of success are subjective. "Grossman and colleagues reported significant reductions in aggression as reported by observers, but not teachers or parents. Greenberg, Kusche, Cook, and Quamma (1995) found one-year follow-up improvements in self-reported conduct problems and teacher ratings of adaptive behavior; these improvements were sustained at two-year follow-up." (1) Subjectivity was reduced in the study by the inclusion of a control group, although this raises a potentially ethically questionable issue, in terms of denying members of the at-risk population crucial life skills with which to deal with conflict. (4)

Both article and media source are fairly silent on exactly how the mediation process is to occur -- again, if peers or teachers can be objective in terms of mediating conflict, and if the strategies that are taught through such programs really affect the development of students whom may be genetically, environmentally, and/or socially predisposed to acting out against percieved discrimination in the social hierchy of the school system with violence. Clearly, ignoring the problem is not the solution, as is evidenced in Columbine, when bullying occurs,

But the issue of the impartiality of peers and teachers within the system seems undeniable, as the peers whom would have been doing the mediating in Columbine could have been 'part of the problem,' or at least part of the percieved popular crowd so detested by the trench coat mafia -- and indeed, the journal article validates this difficulty, by citing the fact that althoguh independent, outiside observers might see a change in the behavior of problem students, those locked into specific perceptions of such difficult students are unwilling or unable to let go of their perceptions.

The question of whether the victims or the potential perpetrators of violence should be focused upon in prevention programs remains controversial, as is evidence by the journal article. The media source simply uses the words peer mediation to suggest this as a potential solution, amognst many other solutions, but the behavior in question is complex, and merely because specific disputes are resolved in a mediated format, by peers, teachers, or disinterested parties specialized in mediation negotiation such as ADR, does not mean violence will be eliminated.