Date of Award
5-21-2024
Document Type
Open Access Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
School Psychology
First Advisor
Amy Cook
Second Advisor
Meliissa Pearrow
Abstract
Schools can be impacted by systemic inequities like structural racism. Structural racism can manifest as racial disparities in school discipline. These negative outcomes for students were considered as this study examined positive youth development (PYD) outcomes from integrating restorative justice and Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR). This study used a transcendental phenomenology design to examine participants’ former high school experiences, their understanding of restorative justice and YPAR, and experiences of agency during the implementation of the Muunganiko Curriculum. The curriculum implementation included a sample of 14-lessons out of a 21-lesson curriculum that integrates the concepts of restorative justice and the YPAR epistemology that was implemented in seven weekly sessions at UMass Boston. Purposive sampling methods were used resulting in four first-year UMass Boston undergraduate students participating in the study. Data were collected pre and post implementation via focus groups with participants, and participants engaged in individual semi-structured interviews post implementation. The results from thematic analysis suggested participants perceived high school as having nuances of both negative and positive experiences, and the participants self-advocated to persevere through those high school experiences. This study also found that participants showed a growing understanding of restorative justice and its application, and a broadened understanding of research. The participants' reflection on their sense of agency during curriculum implementation included an increased sense of voice and acceptance and consensus-building to ground a research topic.
Overall, this study points to several implications such as consideration of this curriculum as a tool to promote PYD, facilitation of a greater understanding of restorative justice and engaging in meaningful research in YPAR, implications for social justice, and further contributions to school psychology. The study presented limitations regarding recruitment and sampling procedures, data analysis due to the small sample size, and transferability to high school students. Areas of further research point to further exploration of the integration of restorative justice and YPAR to promote PYD, examination of broader PYD outcomes, curriculum implementation as a multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) intervention, and how curriculum implementation may address structural racism and interrupt the school-to-prison pipeline.
Recommended Citation
Hall, Alec, "The Muunganiko Curriculum: A Piloted Tier 2 Intervention That Integrates Restorative Justice and Youth Participatory Action Research" (2024). Graduate Doctoral Dissertations. 1140.
https://scholarworks.umb.edu/doctoral_dissertations/1140
Included in
Community-Based Research Commons, Community Psychology Commons, Curriculum and Instruction Commons, Curriculum and Social Inquiry Commons, Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research Commons, Educational Methods Commons, Higher Education Commons, School Psychology Commons, Secondary Education and Teaching Commons, Social Justice Commons
Comments
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