Gigi’s freshman year at Amundsen High School started with a bang, for all the wrong reasons. She snapped at teachers, got into fights, was often late to class, and was a regular in detention.
Before, just one of those transgressions at the 1,200-student school on Chicago’s North Side would likely have gotten her what it got most kids across America’s third-largest school district: a no-questions-asked 10-day suspension.
But when Christian Pederson, the school’s restorative justice coordinator and her swim team coach, heard that Gigi's closest friend had recently died, his response to her behavior was very different. Mr. Pederson went straight to her physics class, pulled her out, and offered a few simple words: “So, I heard what happened. You're part of the swim team; we're a family.”
[For more of this story, written by Josh Kenworthy and Weston Williams, go to http://www.csmonitor.com/Equal...plinary-tool-empathy]
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