Ounce Of Peer Prevention Students Trained To Help Classmates Settle Disputes Peacefully

Students from Coeur d’Alene’s high schools and middle schools took their training in peer mediation pretty seriously Friday afternoon.

Some said they thought the program could help prevent deadly violence like last week’s triple murder in Moses Lake.

“It’s not just in Florida or New York,” said Jennifer Sorenson, a somber-faced seventh-grader from Lakes Middle School.

“It’s right here,” she said, thrusting her index finger toward her feet.

The three dozen students leaned forward in their chairs, kept eye contact with each other and nodded as they practiced their listening skills.

Only a few collapsed into giggles. Underneath the nervous laughter, they understood the importance of their task.

“When you people go back to your schools, what you will be doing is making peace between people,” Coeur d’Alene school counselor Norm Mahoney told the students as they began a two-day workshop.

Peer mediation is a new method of de-escalating violence for secondary schools in Coeur d’Alene. It’s used in varying degrees in Spokane schools.

The procedure puts student mediators together with students who are in conflict. The mediators help their peers arrive at a solution without adult intervention.

Teachers and counselors nominated students from a variety of social groups for the training. They looked for students who were trustworthy and good listeners.

A handful of Coeur d’Alene high school students and counselors were trained a month ago in Moscow.

“The kids create the best resolutions and the most long-lasting resolutions - better than the adults,” said Mary Brown, Spokane schools’ supervisor of student services.

Educators from Spokane schools that do not use peer mediation were trained in it Thursday.

“If we ever hope to eliminate weapons in the schools and violence, we have to find ways for kids to defend themselves in a fair setting,” Brown said.

On Friday, Coeur d’Alene trainers were frank with the students about their thoughts on the shooting spree that killed two students and teacher Leona Caires in Moses Lake.

“Maybe this can prevent something like that from happening,” Mahoney said. “I don’t know, but this is a try. This is a try.”

The suspect in the classroom killings, 14-year-old Barry Loukaitis, has been described as a loner who was often the subject of teasing.

“Even if that kid did that, I don’t think it’s all his fault,” said Lakes Middle School sixth-grader Tracy Burt. “People needed to reach out to him.”

Some students reach out to each other in many schools through the Natural Helpers program. Students trained as Natural Helpers know how to listen to their peers and seek help for them when necessary.

Peer mediation is a more formal intervention that uses a detailed process for resolving conflicts.

Middle and high schools in the Meridian School District near Boise have been using peer mediation for four years with dramatic results, said Mary Adams, vice principal of Eagle High School in Meridian, Idaho.

“I’d be surprised if we had more than a couple of fights a year since we started it,” Adams said. “Before, we had about one a month.”

Most of the conflicts involve rumors that spread among friends, name-calling and jealousy. Student mediators also have handled cases of sexual harassment, minority harassment, theft and vandalism, she said.

Students are referred to mediators by other students, counselors and teachers.

Adams recalled one emotionally disturbed student who was helped by peer mediation.

“I had seen her in the halls,” Adams said. “Her whole body was anger. It was stiff. She kept her head down, frowned and wouldn’t speak with anybody.”

Another student requested a mediation session with her, and after that she started using mediation so much that Adams thought it bordered on the ridiculous, she said.

“But I saw an enormous change in her,” Adams said. “Eventually things slowed down. The complaints she brought to mediation became more normal. She starting walking through the hallways with her head up.”

Perhaps most important, she started talking to people, Adams said.

Cases like that lead Adams to believe that peer mediation can help prevent walking time-bombs from exploding in school.

On Friday, members of Coeur d’Alene’s first troop of student mediators were confident that the program would work.

“Kids would rather talk to their peers than adults,” sixth-grader Kristi Merk said. “I think Lakes (Middle School) really needs it.”

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