Dispute resolution at the Eilermark School
"It is not the conflict itself that is the problem, but the way it is dealt with."
[Faller, Wackmann, Kerntke, 1996]
With student dispute resolution, we want to establish a form of participation at the Eilermark School in which the students themselves can determine and change the school climate and the way they interact with each other in the long term.
The resolution discussion offers the disputants the opportunity to listen to each other and engage in conversation. In this way, they get to know each other's points of view and injuries: they adopt the other person's point of view. This enables them to find ideas and reach agreements that are a good solution for both sides.
The aim of mediation is to build a bridge on which the disputants can come together. The disputants themselves build this bridge. The mediators have learned to help with this: finding the common thread, keeping the goal in mind, emphasizing important points, reflecting feelings and opinions.
Dispute resolution promotes a wide range of skills and attitudes in all children: e.g. acceptance of otherness and differences, willingness to rethink, dialog-oriented discussion, non-violent action, participation, personal responsibility, empathy.
Since the 2016/2017 school year, third-year pupils at the Eilermark School have been trained as mediators. Voluntarily and in addition to their lessons, they learn and practise the tools for dispute resolution in a training course: how they can deal with situations in the schoolyard and what it means to be a mediator.
After a mediator examination, they are then officially welcomed and introduced as the school's new mediators by the school management in front of the whole school.
The Eilermark School would like to thank all the mediators for their great commitment!