Peer Mediation

Students who fight in our school come to mediation to work out their problems with the help of a "peer mediator". A peer mediator is another student who assists the students with talking out their problems, helping both sides of the story to be heard without screaming or another fight, and we also help them to come up with an agreement that is both reasonable to both sides. The mediation gets brought to us through students, deans, teachers, and parents. Parents call for their children when there is going to be a fight that includes their child and they want it solved before and physical violence happens. Students also come to our mediation room because they want to solve it before hand. Deand and teachers either have heard rumors of a fight that is going to take place or a verbal or physical fight has already taken place and they want the two to work it out before anything goes futher. We begin by getting both names and introducing ourselves. We then tell them the rules of mediation and make sure they both agree to mediate if not we can not mediate them. We then hear both sides of the story and summarize what happened. We ask questions and get the story in full detail. We then have the students come up with suggestions for an agreement i.e their future relationship. We then make sure they think its fair on both sides and have them sign the agreement. If one does not sign then the mediation did not work out. Most of the time both parties sign.