Trauma-Informed Restorative Practices Program
Since August 2018 Interagency Academy and The Delridge Neighborhoods Development Association (DNDA) have partnered through a trauma-informed restorative justice program to expand access to basic needs, trauma-informed arts education, youth mentorship, and educator wellness. Through our partnerships we have served over 160 students and provided more than 20 trainings to over 80 Interagency educators. It is through partnerships with community organizations such as Arts Corps, Credible Messengers, and trauma-informed practitioners Briana Herman Brand and Dr. Bre Hazilip that we have provided youth programming and staff professional development to support in the development of a school learning and development ethos that centers physical, psychological and socioemotional wellbeing of students, staff and the larger community.
Current Partners
Arts Corps provides restorative practices through the arts two days a week across seven campuses. Arts Corps is a nationally recognized youth arts education organization that works to address the race and income-based opportunity gap in access to arts education. Through participation in arts integration, out-of-school arts and teen leadership programs, youth experience the transformative power of creativity and gain a deepened belief in their own capacity to learn, take risks, persist and achieve.
Affinity Group Wellness Partners
DNDA contracts with community leaders who are skilled in circle keeping, mediation and de-escalation. They serve as program consultants supporting Interagency Academy in developing and leading affinity trainings, co-develop curriculum, work within their specific affinity group and across affinity groups, and support cross-departmental restorative and equity efforts. For more information on our affinity groups please review the affinity group charter.
Interagency Student Restorative Justice Team
The Student Restorative Justice team’s mission is to provide trauma-informed practice training to students to support the growth of student voice and decision making the institution. This work allows students to not only support administrators in co-developing a culture of healing and equity but also to provide a way for students to grow into leadership and gain vital skills in behavioral intervention methods.
Past Partners
25+ years as an Educator (public and private), Trainer, Facilitator, and Circle Keeper. Jackie creates learning environments that lift barriers between people and open fresh possibilities for connection, collaboration, and understanding. This approach allows participants to communicate in honest and authentic ways establishing trust and building positive relationships. By building trust and relationships community members are more inclined to identify issues and solidify actions plans in a more harmonious and beneficial manner.
Northwest Credible Messenger Consortium (NWCM) & Progress Pushers
The vision of both NWCM & PP is to keep our young people productively engaged in networks of support. Through weekly transformative mentoring sessions, activities, skill-building workshops, presentations and parental engagement NWCM & PP will strive to serve as a bridge between young people, families, and the communities.
Credible Messengers are committed agents of change who understand the importance of integrity, have demonstrated the power of transformation and through those experiences, training and education are skilled in supporting the development of culturally effective responses to childhood misbehavior that have resulted in their disconnection from school.
Kathei, affectionately known as Coach Kathei, is an ordained minister, Certified Life Coach, Author and Spiritual Advisor with a passionate mission to empower women to live in the fierceness of truth and freedom. Kathei is committed to teaching the powerful principles and beliefs that helped her find her own fierceness of self-love, truth and confidence through coaching, leading workshops, speaking at retreats and publishing writings that boldly address issues that block women from their own freedom. Kathei is the author of the book, To Mothers Raising Sons: How to Love Them to Life Instead of Death. After grieving the painful murder of her one and only child, her son, K'Breyan Clark, she sought out and created sacred space for Mothers to heal from emotional trauma, drama and “their mamas,” so they experience true wholeness and have tools to raise emotionally healthy boys. Kathei believes, “healed Mothers heal the world.
National Poetry Slam Champion, Christa Bell, has toured hundreds of venues, colleges and festivals internationally with award-winning feminist spoken word poetry and theater. A charismatic performer, she imagines new conceptual realities that embody the process of social change and cultural healing. Her performance work is primarily concerned with feminist imaginings of the divine as well as how women’s spiritual self-esteem impacts their participation in the political processes that govern their lives. Her research interests include black feminist theory and genealogies, feminist cultural production, performance studies and cultural intersections of race, gender, culture and theology. Her current performance work is scheduled to be included in the Whitney Museum of American Art: 2014 Biennial as part of HOWDOYOUSAYYAMINAFRICAN, a global collective.
Christy Abrams – Brown Girls Write’s Girl Speak Program
GirlSpeak™ is an expressive writing program that teaches women of color how to use their story as a platform for healing. Expressive writing is a powerful tool that can give young women an opportunity to resolve inner conflict, develop compassionate communication and build strong interpersonal skills.
Whether, a novice or skilled writer, this workshop will help participants develop self-awareness, increase communication skills, and create healthy boundaries to further their healing journey.
Christy Abram is a best-selling author and founder of Brown Girls Write—a self-care initiative that helps women and girls of color heal through expressive writing. For over a decade, Christy has dedicated her life to helping women of color speak their truth and rise above brokenness. With her past as a guidepost, Christy uses storytelling to share bold narratives and transform lives. Her workshops and groups offer participants a safe place to reflect, heal, and thrive.
DeVitta Briscoe is the Survivor Network Coordinator with Collective Justice where she is building communities of healing and support for crime survivors most commonly affected by violence, including young people of color, and elevating those voices in policy discussions for public safety and criminal justice transformation. DeVitta draws on her personal experience as a survivor of multiple forms of violence and her professional experience providing intervention, and frontline support for youth of color to reduce gun violence, ensure police accountability, and empower grieving families. She is the founder of the McCaney Project, an organization DeVitta started after she lost her son Donald McCaney to gun violence in 2010. She has also partnered with the Tacoma’s Gang Reduction Project to launch Gun SafeT: “Lock and Unload,” a City of Tacoma initiative to help raise awareness and bring safety education around firearm use, and with Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carrol’s campaign "A Better Seattle," which was aimed at ending youth violence.
In February 2016, her brother Che Taylor was killed by Seattle Police and DeVitta began working on police reform, along with her brother André Taylor who is the founder of Not This Time. She gathered signatures for I-873 and then I-940, regarding use of deadly force by police. In January of 2018, DeVitta was appointed to the King County Inquest Review Committee, to ensure officer-involved shootings are a more fair and transparent process. Her most recent position with Puget Sound Educational Service District (PSESD) she worked as an education advocate helping teens involved with juvenile justice and their families navigate the education system. She is also trained to facilitate Restorative Justice-based healing circles, and the Alive & Free™ violence prevention methodology. DeVitta is a graduate of Evergreen State College.
