Project Harmony

     http://www.projectharmony.org/

 

In April of 2005, members of the Winooski Police Department and Janelle Gilbert-Fuller, of the Winooski Community Justice Center, met with three Police Officers and two Educators from Armenia.  This was funded by a grant from the US Department of State under the ZANG Armenian Legal Socialization Project.  The Winooski Community Justice Center gave a role play demonstration of a Reparative Board during part of the presentation.

The ZANG professionals saw value in the restorative nature of the Reparative Board process.  They requested Project Harmony put together a training program for them that would provide more information about Youth Justice as it relates to Restorative Justice in the United States. 

In August of 2005, Project Harmony asked Janelle Gilbert Fuller, Director of the Winooski Community Justice Center, to put together a team and curriculum which will give Armenian ZANG professionals the tools they need to design their own Community Justice Centers to address Youth Justice issues.

 

Summary of October 2005 Trip to Armenia

by Janelle Gilbert-Fuller

 

                I.    Program Summary                       

                II.   Summary of and Commentary on Presentations                           

                III.  Successes

 

I.                   Program Summary 

Between October 15 and October 28, 2005 four US trainers visited three Marz in Armenia to conduct full day seminars entitled “Community Juvenile Justice In The US”.  Paul Townsend, a Winooski Police Department Police Officer, Derek Miodownik , a Vermont Department of Corrections professional, and Wendy Scully, a Winooski Reparative Board Volunteer, traveled with me to present these three seminars.  We were also privileged to observe three ZANG classes during our two week stay.  The goals of this program were to further the understanding of Restorative Justice as it pertains to Juvenile violations of law and school misbehavior.  My professional goals were to gain an accurate understanding of Armenian culture and to amend our planned program presentations to reflect respect of the cultural differences.

   

II.                Summary of and Commentary on Presentations 

The presentation was divided into six parts; Restorative Justice History, Restorative Justice Concepts, Collaborations to support Restorative Justice, Successes of Restorative Justice in the Winooski Community, A Police Officer’s Role in the Reparative Process, and Setting Up A Reparative Board.  We followed all presentations with a Panel Discussion (a change from the planned Reparative Board Role Play).

Restorative Justice History- This piece presented some challenges as it was the lead piece of the presentations.  The first group of participants demonstrated eagerness for earlier practical application information.  The team elected to continue to lead with this piece as it truly set the foundation for the rest of the training. This piece was presented by Derek Miodownik .

Restorative Justice Concepts- This presentation generated much discussion amongst participants.  This piece was designed to have participants examine their own value base as it relates to criminal justice.  This became a little challenging to us English-only speakers as we could not follow the flow of conversation between participants and it was impossible to the translator to keep up.  This problem was solved by involving the translator in some facilitating of the group during this section of the discussion.  The high level of inter-discussion in this section demonstrated to the trainers that there was a high level of interest in the material covered.  We moved this piece into different order of presentation in order to give more factual information to participants first.  The US team agreed with PH Armenia staff that the first audience seemed to very much desire this change in order.  This piece was presented by Derek Miodownik . 

Collaborations to support Restorative Justice- PowerPoint was used to illustrate this section, the goal of which was to have participants examine their own local assets which could be used to support Restorative Justice within communities through the sharing of our local network.  This exercise requested that they revisit their knowledge of possible collaborations after the training.  I cannot assess whether this occurred.  This presentation was delivered by Janelle Gilbert-Fuller .

Successes of Restorative Justice in the Winooski Community- Different groups had different levels of interest in the statistics of this piece.  The goal was to provide some evaluation of Restorative Justice with cost comparison against the existing Vermont Juvenile Justice System costs.  In the first presentation, much further data was requested. This presentation was delivered by Janelle Gilbert-Fuller . 

A Police Officer’s Role in the Reparative Process -This PowerPoint presentation was translated into Armenian for the participants’ easier understanding. The presenter did a great job of speaking to the translated piece.  The factual nature of this presentation was very well received and generated much discussion.  Participants seemed to appreciate the “real life” nature of the information.  Enough time was not allotted for the pace of the presentation during the first two presentations.  This was corrected in the third presentation. This piece was delivered by Paul Townsend.   

Setting Up A Reparative Board- The presenter of this piece made adjustments to ensure cultural relevance.  Through dynamic presentation, the functioning of Reparative Boards and the best qualities of Reparative Board Members were discussed.  The presenter used knowledge of best practice in education to fully engage the interest of participants in the presentation. Wendy Scully was the presenter of this piece.

   

III.             Successes 

I perceived that the differing styles of presentation really worked in capturing the interest and attention of all three groups. Two indicators of the programs success were the expressed interest of Nelly Duryan, Minister of Armenian Juvenile Justice Department.  She stated interest in adapting Restorative Justice to her existing work with youth.  I really enjoyed our discussion about Community Justice Centers meeting the needs of communities and US social work programs.

We met with Edward Schack, Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Officer at the US Embassy in Yerevan .  I believe we successfully communicated to him the importance of Restorative Justice in the continuum of response to crime.  We had a wonderful conversation about his work in Armenia and his history in supporting Project Harmony projects.  We were very pleased that he could find some time to attend part of our first seminar in Yerevan on October 19th.   

 

If you would like more information about the Winooski Community Justice Center's work with Project Harmony, please contact Janelle Gilbert-Fuller.

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