Coordinator: Instituto Jacques Maritain (Italy)
Project partners: A.P.S Nathan (Italy), Fundatia Professional (Romania), Asociacion Ambit (Spain), European Forum for Restorative Justice (Belgium), Udruga Za Kreativni Socijalni Rad (Croatia).
Duration: Nov 2020 - May 2023
Funding: EU Erasmus +
Summary of the project: Over the last years, Europe has seen the development of very different training proposals related to Restorative Justice (RJ) and mediation, some of which tend to train mediators as individual professionals with postgraduate courses, others tend to form groups of mediators linked to specific communities. The MEDIAREJ project aims to take stock of various training methods and implementing them through joint staff training and work on innovative IOs in 4 European countries, establishing a network among trained professionals and organisations.
Goals of the project:
- Fostering restorative justice competencies in different target groups by disseminating the restorative justice methodology thanks to training courses and multiplier events;
- Developing a standardised competencies framework, a course curriculum for training, original methods and new toolkits.
- Providing training for 28 mediators, trainers and professionals.
- Raising awareness on restorative justice for other target groups at a local level through 4 dissemination events in Italy, Spain, Croatia, Romania, as well as 2 final conferences to be organised in Triest and in Brussels;
- Empowering staff and strengthening the operational capacity of local restorative justice centres, creating a permanent expert group of trainers at the European level.
- Matching an adequate quality standard to build more expertise of experienced mediators, thus allowing skills recognition, facilitating the mobility at the European level of mediation and restorative justice experts.
EFRJ involvement in the project MEDIAREJ:
Within the framework for this project, the EFRJ is responsible for the first intellectual output ("Framework of competencies for trainers on mediation based on restorative justice") which will take the form of a handbook for restorative justice training programmes (due by 31 May 2021) and will set the basis for the following activities within this project. The consultation process for the handbook will include a focus group discussion with the EFRJ Training Committee and an online survey for the European Register of Qualified Restorative Justice Trainers as well as tailor-made interviews with specific professionals in the field. In March 2023, the EFRJ will also organise the international final conference of the MEDIAREJ project in Brussels. Finally, the EFRJ is responsible for the sustainability and follow up activities once the project ends.
