5144.12 - Challenging behavior prevention: restorative practices response

P5144.12

Students

Challenging Behavior Prevention: Restorative Practices Response

Introduction

Related to all matters of student discipline, the Board of Education requires district staff to make every effort to correct student challenging behavior through school-based resources and to support students in learning the skills necessary to enhance a positive school climate and avoid challenging behavior.

For most behaviors, schools should minimize the use of in-school and out-of-school suspensions, recommendations for expulsion, and referrals to law enforcement to the extent practicable while in compliance with state statutes, local ordinances, and mandatory reporting laws. It is the goal of the Windsor Locks Public Schools and the Board of Education that the juvenile and criminal justice systems be utilized rarely to address all forms of challenging behavior.

All challenging behavior procedures and responses shall ensure due process and be enforced uniformly, fairly, consistently, and in a manner that does not discriminate on the basis of ethnicity, race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, or disability.

For the school year beginning July 1, 2025, the Windsor Locks Board of Education adopts this “Restorative Practices Response” policy to be implemented by school employees for incidents of challenging behavior or student conflict that is nonviolent and does not constitute a crime. This policy shall not include the involvement of school resource officers or other law enforcement officials as part of the discipline process unless the behavior or conflict becomes violent or criminal.

The Board of Education (Board) supports the District’s fundamental mission to provide all students the opportunity to achieve academically and socially and emotionally, ethically, civically, and intellectually at the highest levels and to become a contributing and engaged citizen in our diverse society. All students should have the opportunity to develop their skills, knowledge, and competencies in a nurturing and accountable school setting. Schools play an important role in helping families and children make responsible decisions, cooperate with others, and have a successful life. Children, at times, find it difficult to manage their emotions and focus on their studies effectively. Developmentally appropriate social and emotional skills building allows students to cope with stress so they can access learning and develop into productive adults. Learning is a social activity, meaning children must be ready to learn by regulating their emotions and working constructively with others. Social and emotional learning (SEL) helps build a positive school climate by developing emotional intelligence through self-awareness, self-management, goal setting, social awareness, relationship building, collaborative skills, and responsible decision-making. Students should receive effective and engaging teaching, with curriculum, instruction, and assessment designed to address the needs of diverse learners.

Restorative approaches recognize students' unique strengths, needs, and interests and present an opportunity for schools to develop a structure that utilizes practices that will create a more equitable path for all students. Utilizing restorative practices allows schools to embody more equitable approaches and meet students’ short—and long-term needs.

The Board believes that all students have a right to attend schools that are safe and free from unnecessary disruption. Appropriate student behavior, reinforced by an effective system of discipline, is essential to creating and maintaining a positive school climate. This is the joint responsibility of students, staff, parents, and the community.

The Board requires District schools to implement restorative practices in response to conflict and harm. The “Restorative Practices Response” philosophy supported by the Board views misconduct as a violation against people and damaging to relationships in the school and throughout the community. The Board recognizes that schools may involve a wide range of people in the “Restorative Practices Response” process, voluntarily including victims, who are often teachers, school staff, bystanders, other students, and the school community.

The four main goals of Restorative Practices Response are:

1. Relationship Building: creating a school environment where everyone is safe, welcomed, supported, and included in all school-based activities and focuses on high-quality, constructive relationships among the school community members;

2. Accountability: Restorative Practices Response strategies hold each student accountable for any challenging behavior;

3. Community Safety: Restorative Practices recognize the need to keep the school community safe through strategies ensuring that all students have a role in repairing relationships affected by challenging behavior. In safe, supportive education environments students feel a sense of belonging and allow schools to challenge policies and procedures that prevent student growth;

4. Competency Development: Restorative Practices Response seeks to increase the social-emotional intelligence skills of those who have harmed others, address underlying factors that lead students to engage in the form of challenging behavior, and build on strengths.

Definitions

Through adopting the Connecticut School Climate Policy (5131.911), the Board endorses a “Restorative Practices Response” approach to student discipline. As defined in Policy 5131.911,

Restorative Practices mean evidence and research-based system-level practices that focus on (A) building high-quality, constructive relationships among the school community, (B) holding each student accountable for any challenging behavior, and (C) ensuring each such student has a role in repairing relationships and reintegrating into the school community. Challenging Behavior Prevention: Restorative Practices Response

“Challenging Behavior” means behavior that negatively impacts school climate or interferes, or is at risk of interfering with, the learning or safety of a student or the safety of a school employee.

“Evidenced-Based Practices” in education refer to instructional and school-wide improvement practices that systematic empirical research has provided evidence of statistically significant effectiveness.

“School Climate” means the quality and character of school life, with a particular focus on the quality of the relationships within the school community. It is based on patterns of people’s experiences of school life and reflects the norms, goals, and organizational structures within the school community.

“Social and Emotional Learning” means the process through which children and adults achieve emotional intelligence through the competencies of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills and responsible decision-making.

“Emotional Intelligence” means the ability to (A) perceive, recognize, and understand emotions in oneself or others, (B) use emotions to facilitate cognitive activities, including, but not limited to, reasoning, problem-solving and interpersonal communication, (C) understand and identify emotions, and (D) manage emotions in oneself and others.

“School Community” means any individuals, groups, businesses, public institutions and nonprofit organizations that are invested in the welfare and vitality of a public school system and the community in which it is located, including, but not limited to, students and their families, members of the local or regional board of education, volunteers at a school and school employees.

“School Environment” means a school-sponsored or school-related activity, function or program, whether on or off school grounds, including at a school bus stop or on a school bus or other vehicle owned, leased or used by a local or regional board of education, and may include other activities, functions or programs that occur outside of a school-sponsored or school-related activity, function or program if bullying at or during such other activities, functions or programs negatively impacts the school environment.

Purpose

The purpose of this policy is to support school discipline that:

1. The school district community has a shared vision and plan for promoting and sustaining a positive school climate that focuses on prevention, identification and response to all challenging behavior;

2. Maintains safe and engaging learning communities;

3. Assures consistency and coherence across all schools in the District;

4. Defines and communicates expectations for student behavior;

5. Defines and communicates expectations for staff responsibility related to school discipline;

6. Balances the needs of the student, the needs of those directly affected by “challenging behaviors,” and the needs of the overall school community;

7. Assures equity across racial, ethnic, and cultural groups and all other protected classes, including, but not limited to, gender, color, national origin, ancestry, religion, age, disability, sexual orientation, and gender identity and expression.

General Principles

1. A positive school climate is best accomplished by preventing challenging behaviors before they occur and using effective restorative practices, in response to those challenging behaviors that may occur despite proactive measures;

2. School safety and academic success are formed and strengthened when all school staff and employees build positive relationships with students and their parents and/or guardians;

3. Effective school climate maximizes the amount of time students spend learning academically, socially, and emotionally, ethically, civically, and intellectually and minimizes the amount of time students cause disruption or are removed from their classrooms due to an act of challenging behavior;

4. School discipline should be reasonable, timely, fair, age-appropriate, and should be proportionate to the student’s challenging behavior. Response to an act of challenging behavior that is rooted in restorative practices will provide meaningful instruction and guidance, offers students an opportunity to learn from their mistakes and is more likely to result in engaging rather than punitive responses to challenging behavior. The school community should adopt policies that promote a restorative school environment focused on overcoming barriers to teaching and learning by building and supporting meaningful school-wide relationships, and intentionally re-engaging and disengaged students, educators, and families of students in the school community;

5. Effective school climate improvement is a restorative process that engages all school community members in promoting a positive school climate. The vast majority of challenging behaviors should be addressed at the classroom level by teachers; however, behaviors that cannot be addressed at this level should receive more targeted and intensive interventions, as determined by an individualized assessment;

6. The District serves a diverse community. In order to serve all students and to prepare them to be members of an increasingly diverse community, schools and staff must build cultural competence. We must commit to eliminating institutional racism and any other discrimination that presents barriers to success. The school community should create a school environment where everyone is safe, welcomed, supported, and included in all school-based activities;

7. Challenging behaviors, which may be subject to disciplinary action, including any within the school environment, but not limited to those occurring during either curricular or extracurricular activities, in classrooms, in school buildings, on school grounds, or in school vehicles, when such conduct is detrimental to the school environment and to the welfare or safety of other students or school personnel.

General Policy Guidelines

The District’s system of school climate improvement is built on the incorporation of restorative practices, which should include:

Evidence and research-based system-level restorative practices that focus on:

1)      building high-quality, constructive relationships among the school community,

2)      holding each student accountable for any challenging behavior, and

3)      ensuring each such student has a role in repairing relationships and reintegrating into the school community.

Restorative practices should be guided by the Connecticut School Climate Standards:

1. The school district community has a shared vision and plan for promoting and sustaining a positive school climate that focuses on prevention, identification, and response to all challenging behaviors.

2. The school district community adopts policies that promote: a) a sound school environment that develops and sustains academic, social, emotional, ethical, civic, and intellectual skills; and b) a restorative school environment focused on overcoming barriers to teaching and learning by building and supporting meaningful school-wide relationships, and intentionally reengaging any disengaged students, educators, and families of students in the school community.

3. The school community’s practices are identified, prioritized, and supported to: a) promote learning and the positive academic, social, emotional, ethical, and civic development of students. b) enhance engagement in teaching, learning, and school-wide activities. c) address barriers to teaching and learning; and d) develop and sustain a restorative infrastructure that builds capacity, accountability, and sustainability.

4. The school community creates a school environment where everyone is safe, welcomed, supported, and included in all school-based activities,

5. The school community creates a restorative system that cultivates a sense of belonging through norms and activities that promote social and civic responsibility, and a dedication to cultural responsiveness, diversity, equity, and inclusion.

a. Practicing early identification and assessment of struggling students;

b.     Using a problem-solving/collaborative process to provide interventions matched to student needs;

c.      Ensuring timely progress monitoring and feedback; and

d.      Delivering scientific research-based interventions.

The District shall post this policy on the District website and in each school. A copy of this policy and accompanying procedures shall be readily available in each school’s administration office.

Copies of this policy, any accompanying procedures/regulations, and school rules will be made available, upon request, to each student and parent/guardian and, upon request, promptly translated into a language that the parent/guardian can understand.

Applying the goals related to Restorative Practices Response, this policy’s definitions, purpose, principles and guidelines, the Superintendent, or his/her/their designee shall develop such procedures and provide for any training necessary as may be needed to effectively implement this policy.

(cf. 1110.1 – Parent Involvement)

(cf. 4131 – Staff Development)

(cf. 5114 – Suspension/Expulsion; Student Due Process)

(cf. 5131 – Conduct)

(cf. 5131.1 – Bus Conduct)

(cf. 5131.6 – Drugs, Alcohol, Tobacco)

(cf. 5131.7 – Weapons and Dangerous Instruments)

(cf. 5131.8 – Out of School Grounds Misconduct)

(cf. 5131.9 – Gang Activity or Association)

(cf. 5131.911 – Connecticut School Climate Policy)

(cf. 5131.913 – Cyberbullying)

(cf. 5131.92 – Corporal Punishment)

(cf. 5141.4 – Reporting of Child Abuse and Neglect)

(cf. 5144 – Discipline/Punishment)

(cf. 5144.3 – Discipline of Students with Disabilities)

(cf. 5145.4 – Nondiscrimination)

(cf. 5145.5 – Sexual Harassment)

(cf. 5145.52 – Harassment)

Legal Reference:  Connecticut General Statues

4-177 through 4-180.  Contested Cases.  Notice.  Record, as amended.

10-233a through 10-233f Suspension, removal and expulsion of students, as periodically amended.

2la-240(9) Definitions.

53a-3 Definitions.

GOALS 2000: Educate America Act, Pub.  L. 103-227.

18 U.S.C. 921 Definitions

Title III - Amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Act Sec. 314

Elementary and Secondary Schools Act of 1968, as amended by the Gun Free Schools Act of 1994

PL 105-17 The Individuals with Disabilities Act, Amendments of 1997

P.L. 108-446 Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004

State v. Hardy, 896 A.2d 755, 278 Conn 113 (2006)

Public Act 23-167, Section 74, An Act Concerning Transparency in Education

Policy Adopted: August 2025

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