CRE Systems Development
Building educational systems is a long process and requires networks that can support change. The following sections discuss aspects of systems development from global to local levels.
Developing Global Networks for Support. Working across global regions and learning best practices has been very important for the development of CRE and related fields. GPPAC, a worldwide network of civil society organizations dedicated to promoting peace through conflict prevention, is providing one structure for supporting CRE around the world. GPPAC, formed in response to a call by United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, generated its Peace Education Working Group at a United Nations conference in July 2005. Representatives from 27 nations developed an action plan for 13 global regions to work toward peace education and CRE. The key strategic areas for the Peace Education Working Group include the following:
• Building the capacity of regional educators and practitioners
• Exchanging resources including manuals and curriculum
• Promoting good practice in collaboration with ministries of education for inclusion in the national curriculum and in professional development
• Supporting faculty exchanges between countries
• Organizing international and regional conferences to exchange ideas and strengthen collaboration (Shaw, 2010, p. 114)
Curriculum Infusion and Integration. The global initiatives supporting CRE and related fields are very encouraging. But there is considerable work needed in developing systems of support in the United States where the traditional service delivery mechanisms have proven problematic (Elias, Zins, Graczyk, & Weissberg, 2003).
CRE programs have traditionally been introduced into schools through external channels and treated as add-on programs rather than integrated into ongoing curricula, classroom activity, and everyday operation of the school.
This works when resources are available. Unfortunately, when resources dwindle and pressures to “teach to the test” increase, ancillary programs are often terminated, downsized, or underresourced. CRE and SEL educators have learned that the best means of institutionalizing these programs is to make them a part of the daily life of the school through the daily work of its teachers and school staff. It maximizes their impact and their staying power (Elias et al., 2003). Teachers and administrators need more information about best practices in integrating and infusing CRE and SEL (Buchanan, Gueldner, Tran, & Merrell, 2009).Insights from the National Curriculum Integration Project (NCIP), a 3-year study of curriculum infusion and integration in middle schools in four states (Jones & Sanford, 2003), indicate some best practices. NCIP used a pretest-posttest control group comparison design in each state and examined the effect of teaching condition (NCIP experienced teaching, NCIP new teaching, and control teaching) on more than 1,000 seventh- and eighth-grade students’ emotional and conflict competence (conflict orientation, emotional management, perspective taking, and hostile attribution) and classroom climate. NCIP increased students’ perspective taking and use of problem-solving strategies and improved classroom climate. In terms of teacher’s ability to infuse CRE, there is strong evidence that teachers are capable of integrating these concepts and practices in their ongoing curricula (Durlak et al., 2011).
Peaceable SchoolCWhole-School Programs. Few CRE efforts are truly “whole school” because of the time and resources it takes to achieve this level of integration, but research suggests that the work is worth it. At the elementary school level, Responding to Conflict Creatively Program (RCCP) has been the focus of an excellent evaluation (Aber, Brown, & Jones, 2003). RCCP includes teacher training, classroom instruction and staff development, program curriculum, administrator’s training, peer mediation, parent training, and a targeted intervention for high-risk youth.
RCCP is a complex, multiyear, multilevel CRE program. Four waves of data on features of children’s social and emotional development known to forecast aggression and violence were collected in the fall and spring over 2 years for a representative sample of first to sixth graders from New York City Public Schools (N = 11,160). RCCP, when delivered as designed by the classroom teachers, reduced aggressive attitudes and behaviors and increased orientation to academic achievement. Program fidelity was identified as a critical factor. Students in classes where teachers delivered some RCCP but not the amount or nature proscribed actually performed worse on dependent measures than control students.Shapiro, Burgoon, Welker, and Clough (2002) evaluated a middle school CRE intervention (The Peace Builders Program) that trains all school staff to infuse CRE through all aspects of everyday school life. The program was implemented in three middle schools and three elementary schools with one control middle school and one control elementary school and sampled almost 2,000 students with pre- and postprogram assessment. There were significant, positive program effects on knowledge of psychosocial skills, self-reported aggression, and teacher-reported aggression; and there was a 41% decrease in aggression-related disciplinary incidents and a 67% reduction in suspensions for violent behavior.
Yet some research on whole-school programs does not report success. Orpinas and colleagues (2000) evaluated a multicomponent violence prevention intervention, measuring reduction of aggressive behaviors among students of eight middle schools randomly assigned into intervention or control conditions. The intervention included the formation of a School Health Promotion Council, training of peer mediators and peer helpers, training of teachers in conflict resolution, a violence prevention curriculum, and newsletters for parents. All students were evaluated in the spring of 1994, 1995, and 1996 (approximately 9,000 students per evaluation). Cohort and cross-sectional evaluations indicated little effect in reducing aggressive behaviors, fights at school, injuries due to fighting, or missing classes because of feeling unsafe at school or being threatened to be hurt.