THE CIRCLE KEEPERS
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THE CIRCLE KEEPERS *
Check out the 6 programs we’re offering for the 2025-2026 school year using the tabs above!
The Circle Keepers dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline by training & empowering youth as restorative justice practitioners, community organizing activists and socially conscious artists.
We bring healing, restoration and transformation into their communities in ways that center the voices and lived experiences young people.
OUR THEORY OF CHANGE
Restorative Justice in school must place youth in positions of leadership in the pursuit of solving the issues that most affect them. The youth are not the problem, they are the solution!
Restorative Justice, rather than being a set of school discipline interventions, is a “paradigm shift” (Zher, 1990. p220) that reframes how we live in community, what we value and how we collectively address conflict, harms and violence.
Restorative justice tenets such as accountability, engagement, dignity, agency and restoration must be at the center when addressing interpersonal harm in schools.
Restorative Justice must be antiracist, grounded on indigenous and Black epistemologies such as knowledge of self, wisdom of elders, respect for all living things, and caring for the most vulnerable.
