Abstract:
A team at Waikato completed two projects on restorative conferencing in schools for the Ministry of Education, under the rubric of the Suspension Reduction Initiative. The projects included developing and trialling processes for suspension hearings using restorative conferencing and principles from restorative justice. Objectives of both projects were related to the desire to reduce numbers of suspensions and exclusions, particularly of Maori children. This paper reports on these two projects, and reflects on some of the questions they raised.