Resolutionary Partners

Resolutionary Partners is a collaboration between Temple University Center for Conflict Management and Media Impact, Citizens Police Oversight Commission, SEPTA Transit Police, Achieve Academy East, CB Schools, and the School District of Philadelphia (SROs, educators and students) for Category 1 BJA/DOJ STOP funding to provide comprehensive and innovative violence prevention in two schools (grades 7-12; ages 13-21) serving at-risk and systems-involved youth (juvenile justice, foster care, homeless, and/or domestic violence) from high violence, high poverty and high trauma communities in Philadelphia. The requested funding ($1,688,668.20) will train 200 high-risk and systems-involved students, 60 law enforcement officers (SROs and SEPTA Transit Police) and 20 teachers and administrators in an innovative, integrated conflict management and violence prevention initiative to address the following areas in the RFP: (3) Train school personnel and educate students on preventing school violence, including strategies to improve school climate; and (4) Specialized training for law enforcement who work in schools and/or with school-age populations. Resolutionary Partners will create communities of conflict managers from students, school staff and law enforcement. Innovative components (e.g., dialogue facilitation, conflict education and intervention focusing on the role of social media in conflict and violence in the schools, conflict coaching ADR processes, youth/law enforcement co-mediation models, and violence de-escalation training from community violence specialists (e.g., Philadelphia Cease Fire)) deepen conventional approaches to violence prevention programming. The program focuses on three initiatives – each of which involves partnering between youth and law enforcement: (1) Resolutionary Education -- Teach It (training in community policing, trauma informed conflict emphasizing racial/historical and intergenerational trauma, impacts of social media on conflict and conflict escalation and management, anti-bias education, restorative practices, and Philadelphia Cease Fire De-escalation); (2) Resolutionary Conversation -- Talk About It (developing and delivering online and in-person media-infused and media-platformed dialogue processes co-facilitated by youth and law enforcement to support honest talk about violence related issues in schools and communities); and (3) Resolutionary Conflict Management -- Work It Out (youth and law enforcement trained as conflict coaches and mediators to serve as third party interveners for school and community conflicts). All partners have worked together in previous and current projects on which Resolutionary Partners is built and RP components have field-tested training curricula and implementation protocols. Expected outcomes include development of youth empowerment and agency, improved relationships between youth and law enforcement, improved school climate, and enhanced violence prevention and conflict management skills for participants.