Conflict Resolution Education as a Solution to the Teacher Retention Crisis

There is a current teacher retention crisis in America. The National Education Association reports that 20 percent of new teachers leave the profession within the first year, with close to 50 percent of teachers in urban districts leaving in the first five years. Schools in the United States are currently fighting a losing battle, facing a combination of low teacher attrition and rising student attendance rates. Total elementary and secondary school enrollment in America will increase by four percent between 2002 and 2014. The resulting combination of low teacher attrition and high student attendance has lead to overcrowded classrooms, a factor which increases the rate of new teachers who leave the profession. This is especially a problem for urban schools with high rates of students who are minorities or are students from low income families.

Classroom management is commonly cited as one of the greatest problems faced by new teachers. Teachers entering the classroom for the first time often have unrealistic expectations of their abilities to manage disputes and disciplinary problems that arise inside their classes. It would follow that equipping new teachers with the skills to effectively manage their classrooms would raise the level of job satisfaction for many people entering the field. This paper proposes that the teacher retention crisis could be addressed by adding conflict management training to pre-service education for new teachers (the preparatory education a teacher receives while in a certification program) and including a simple conflict management and dispute resolution system, developed to be easily integrated into the daily classroom experience.

Armed with conflict resolution training and an effective model of dispute resolution, new teachers would be better prepared for the demands of classroom management. The success of this system depends on the level of teacher training, the cost of the program, and the involvement level of the entire school in implementing conflict resolution devices. Research indicates that making one or several courses in dispute resolution a pre-service training requirement for new teachers will lead to better classroom management and higher teacher retention, provided the dispute resolution system is implemented successfully.

2. Background

A. A National Crisis

The teacher retention crisis has been recently thrust into the national spotlight as the demand upon schools to find qualified teachers has increased due to teacher retirement. Half of the educators who taught during the 1990s are expected to retire between 2000 and 2010. Coupled with falling teacher attrition rates and rising levels of student enrollment, these numbers have left public schools scrambling to keep new teachers from leaving the profession. Additionally alarming is the fact that those teachers with the highest levels of achievement during their preparatory course work are often the first to leave. Taking academic achievement as an indicator of teacher performance inside the classroom, this fact suggests that schools are not only losing fresh teachers, they are losing teachers with the greatest potential only a few years after they've entered the field.

As teacher retention rates have hit critical lows, states have also noticed a decrease in student achievement. The Texas State Board for Educator Certification compared the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills student pass rates for classes of first year teachers with those of classes who had teachers with five or more years of experience and found that students with veteran teachers had significantly higher test scores. This study is particularly striking when viewed in light of the fact that only 38 out of every 100 newly certified teachers remain in Texas classrooms after five years. Statistics like these raise serious questions not only about the state's ability to maintain enough teachers to fill necessary positions, but also about the quality of education inside the schools.

When considering the possible causes for the national teacher retention crisis, one of the first logical causes that springs to mind is the lack of financial advantages for people considering teaching as a career or holding positions in the field. Although salaries for teachers are infamously low, financial unsatisfaction is not commonly named as a reason for leaving the teaching profession. "Indeed, studies indicate that young people often enter teaching out of a sense of calling and are much more motivated by idealism and the perceived lifestyle teaching offers than by salary. Similarly, many second-career professionals are drawn to teaching by idealism and, especially if receiving retirement benefits from their first career, probably do not have salary as their primary concern." Instead, new teachers leaving the profession report feeling unprepared to manage classrooms, overwhelmed by the demands of their profession, and unsupported by their peers.

In addition, new teachers are assigned to low-performance groups of students and classrooms with higher needs, due to the undesirability of the position and the idea that the veteran teachers have "earned" the good classes. As these placements demand additional energy and create additional challenges, the new teacher is indeed facing a losing battle without the shield of experience. Inexperienced teachers are also more likely to be placed in schools with high levels of poverty and minority students. Although these schools carry the highest drop-out rates and greatest potential for academic failure, they are twice as likely to be staffed by novice teachers.

B. Pre-service Training

Many schools and researchers are looking to pre-service training for possible solutions to the problems faced by educators and school administrators. There is evidence of a direct link between the level of pre-service training a teacher receives and the subsequent perceptions of job satisfaction that teacher experiences during his or her career. Therefore, it's very possible that changes in pre-service training would reduce the feelings of unsatisfaction experienced by a large number of first year teachers. For this reason, implementing a conflict resolution training program for teachers is particularly ideal for pre-service teachers who have not begun their teaching careers.

It is important to note that pre-service training alone will not have as great an effect upon job satisfaction as it would when combined with additional measures. Although pre-service training potentially has many benefits, as will be discussed later in the paper, new teachers armed with conflict resolution education skills will not be able to successfully implement these methods in a truly effective way if they are faced with a school environment hostile to the idea. The following section will outline the different conflict resolution education approaches currently used and explain why pre-service training for new teachers is a crucial first step, but only an element of an effective education strategy.

3. Conflict Resolution Education

A. The Need

The list of hurdles faced by educators seems never ending. A learning environment of safety and stability is key to the academic advancement of children, but the creation of this environment is continually challenged by conflicts between students, incompatible learning styles, repercussions of community social conditions and the limited abilities of the teachers themselves. Many educators who entered the field full of enthusiasm and idealism are frustrated by the unexpected demands of the career. In a reflective essay Meghan Mullan, a young teacher placed in an inner-city school, says "My lessons did not go as planned. I had enthusiasm and energy, but those qualities didn't count for much at Laurel Street...What counted was my lack of experience, their lack of self-control, the chaos in the school system, and the violence in the neighborhood. I wanted to teach, and they wanted to learn, but too much stood in the way." She lasted less than two years before quitting.

Conflict resolution education has emerged as an effective and creative solution to many of the problems faced by those in the education field. Schools have looked to alternative dispute resolution theory for solutions when dealing with students who are disciplinary problems, using mediation to address truancy, for example. Many schools have developed student-centered peer mediation. A more comprehensive approach to conflict management has also been successful when implemented in classrooms as a whole, with all students engaging in a discussion of conflict management skills. Educators seeking creative approaches to classroom management have integrated these lessons into regular school subject areas, such as English or Social Studies. In 1995, the National Association for Mediation Education released a statement saying that between 1984 and 1995 the number of conflict resolution education programs across the nation jumped from approximately 50 to well over 5000. According to the Conflict Resolution Education Network (CRENET), 10% of the 86,000 K-12 schools in the U.S. practice some form of conflict resolution education.

B. The Benefits

Conflict resolution education has been found to increase students' academic performances, cooperation skills, self-control, and positive attitudes about school, while decreasing the number of disciplinary matters referred to school officials, drop-out and suspension rates and students' aggressiveness. There is also evidence that simulations in which children practice managing conflict can enhance the development of language skills, perspective awareness and general understanding of social institutions.

The effects of conflict resolution education on the interpersonal skills of children appear to be more successful at nurturing positive relationships between students than teacher intervention during student conflict. A study on the social patterns of preschool age children found that teacher intervention was not generally related to children's peacemaking skills. A negative correlation was found between teacher intervention and conciliation between the opponents. This suggests that relationships between students have a better chance of surviving if the students themselves are equipped with the skills to handle conflicts inside the relationship, as teacher intervention may in fact further damage the friendship.

C. The Approaches

There are four main models used when implementing a conflict resolution education program: the curriculum process approach, the peer mediation approach, the peaceable classroom approach, and the peaceable school approach. Each has its own benefits and problems. The curriculum process approach is an introduction to conflict resolution education for students, usually at an elementary school level, and is taught as a separate lesson through the use of songs, stories, games and class discussion. The benefit of this plan is that it does not affect the established curriculum, it merely adds another activity. That addition, however, is also the drawback of the curriculum process approach. For many teachers faced with the overwhelming responsibilities and demands of being an educator, fitting a separate lesson into an already busy day may simply create more stress.

It may also be harder for students to fully process and understand the lesson if it is separated and is presented as a one-time event rather than a behavioral lifestyle. Research scientists are skeptical of conflict education plans which are designed to be short-term and highly focused, hypothesizing that such designs cannot in fact affect deep-seated personality characteristics. Rather, these scientists argue that a widely focused educational plan, similar to socialization, is necessary to affect the type of central beliefs that conflict resolution education is targeting.

The peer mediation approach is one that many schools are already familiar with. The basics of the peer mediation approach include equipping a small number of students with dispute resolution skills and allowing them to use those skills to resolve disputes among other students. This approach is commonly used in secondary schools, but some elementary schools use peer mediation in their upper classes. The benefits of peer mediation include an increase in peaceful school climate, if properly implemented. The Mediation Project of the Public Justice Department of St. Mary's University of San Antonio Texas provided training for junior and senior high schools in conflict resolution training through a community program. One middle school involved in the project recorded a 57% drop in disciplinary actions during the first year of operation. However, the results of implementation in middle schools are not consistently so positive. The Comprehensive Peer Mediation Evaluation Project, a study consisting of 27 schools in three cities found that peer mediation programs can produce a significant improvement in elementary school climates, but the impact in middle and high schools was not significant. Therefore, this approach may not be appropriate for implementation across all grade levels.

Another drawback of the peer mediation approach is that it most commonly focuses only on directly training a small group of students, although benefits to the entire school in the form of observed social skills may occur. When the New Mexico Center for Dispute Resolution Mediation in Schools program released an evaluation which indicated that schools with the program perceived less violence and hurtful behavior by the students, they noted that students who received direct training as mediators had conflict resolution skills which were more clearly defined than their untrained classmates, who did not fully grasp specific and creative conflict resolution strategies. In addition, the untrained students did not show the levels of confidence demonstrated by trained students and expressed lower levels of satisfaction with school. It may also be difficult for schools to staff a peer mediation program, which for some schools would necessitate the recruitment of a full time coordinator.

Still, the benefits of peer mediation programs should not be dismissed due to the complications in their execution. The reduction in school conflict indicated by the research noted above suggests that while inappropriate as a substitute for a comprehensive conflict resolution education plan at secondary school levels, peer mediation is an excellent support for the creation of a school community with low tolerance for conflict and violence. Therefore, schools interested in successfully maintaining a school climate of respect and cooperation should strongly consider making peer mediation a part of their conflict resolution education plan.

The peaceable classroom approach integrates conflict resolution education content directly into the regular class curriculum. An example of the peaceable classroom approach would be a focus on active listening skills during a lecture or emphasizing group problem solving skills when students are assigned to work together during a science lab. The inclusion of conflict resolution education content in all aspects of a student's educational experience ensures that these skills are repetitively and consistently enforced and the student is constantly given the opportunity to heighten their emotional intelligence. Studies on the peaceable classroom approach have found significant increases in classroom climate, as well as positive effects on students' use of problem-solving strategies.

The peaceable school approach includes the peaceable classroom approach, but expands conflict resolution training to include all school personnel and the school community, including parents. By completely surrounding the students in an environment of people trained in conflict resolution education, the students have a much greater chance of retaining and processing dispute resolution skills. Researchers have found that making conflict resolution education a part of the daily life of the school maximizes the program's impact and staying power. This approach, therefore, would have the greatest impact on teacher retention.

The drawback to the peaceable schools approach is the costs associated with execution. Implementing the peaceable schools approach on a national level seems incredibly overwhelming at first glance. The costs of training and any additional materials for each teacher, in addition to the costs of workshop trainings and publications for school officials, personnel, community figures and parents, make this approach appear impossible. However, by starting with pre-service training and then moving forward into the gradual inclusion of other trained school personnel, the approach becomes possible and attractive as a realistic, long-term solution to the teacher retention crisis.

D. The Solution

Pre-service training is an attractive foundation because it equips new teachers with conflict resolution skills before they are in the field, and therefore allows them to use conflict management tactics more naturally than if they received conflict resolution training after years of developing their teaching style. This is not to say that veteran teachers could not learn conflict resolution education methods but, as statistics show, a large number of inexperienced teachers will be taking over the field in the near future and pre-service education requirements for these rising teachers is a more logical place to start.

In addition, studies conducted on in-service training for teachers found that these teachers had insufficient time to develop conflict resolution education skills and apply them in their classes, unless the school had the resources to pay for external training and consultation. It would appear that waiting until a teacher is working in the field to begin teacher education on conflict resolution skills would have less of an impact upon classroom management skills and could create additional stress for the teacher. For this reason, pre-service training again appears to be the more logical choice.

An additional reason for focusing on pre-service training as the beginning of a comprehensive conflict resolution education plan is that pre-service training shifts the cost from the schools themselves to the pre-service teachers or the universities they attend. Although some costs for developing and staffing an additional conflict resolution education program in their colleges of education will be faced by the universities, it will be easier and more appropriate for the universities to carry this financial burden than the already struggling K-12 schools across the nation, which generally do not have the resources to fund their own training programs, particularly in urban, low income areas.

In response to the successful integration of alternative dispute resolution theories into educational contexts, some universities have already begun to offer trainings for teachers in conflict management skills, both for preservice and veteran educators. The interest has also resulted in an increase in literature available on the topic and non-profit organizations such as the Ohio Commission on Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management have begun to offer trainings and classroom materials for teachers interested in conflict management theories.

Training teachers in alternative dispute resolution skills lowers their stress level by allowing them to be more creative and effective in their approaches to classroom management. This decrease in on-the-job stress would directly impact teacher retention rates, resulting in a more stabilized education experience for students. In addition, bringing alternative dispute resolution into the classroom and making it a part of the school experience would lead to a school climate of lowered conflict, providing a more welcoming environment for new teachers entering the profession. It has also been noted that conflict education programs directly benefit the school staff by raising consensus decision making skills and thus enhancing collaboration. The creation of a faculty skilled in problem-solving methods would therefore likely increase the school's ability for change and progression.

Currently, a few universities that offer certification for educators have some form of conflict resolution education. Some schools only offer a class or two in colleges other than education, while others have full dispute resolution certification programs and make conflict management a part of pre-service education training. State legislatures have also responded to the positive research supporting conflict resolution education. In Wisconsin, teaching license applicants are required to demonstrate competency in resolving conflicts between students. In addition, a Wisconsin state statute requires school administrators to demonstrate competency in resolving conflicts between students, students and staff, and the general school community. This includes the requirement to demonstrate competency in the implementation of peer mediation. This is indicative of the current push to make conflict resolution education part of the mainstream curriculum in our nation's schools. However, conflict resolution education is not yet a significant educational focus.

As interest in conflict resolution education has risen in the past decades, questions have been raised concerning the correlation between conflict resolution education and teacher effectiveness. One federal program currently being implemented is a cooperative initiative between the George Gund Foundation and the U.S. Department of Education Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education. The Conflict Resolution Education in Teacher Education program is designed to provide teacher education on conflict resolution to pre-service teachers throughout their coursework, student teaching, and initial professional practice. The three year program will end in August 2007 and statistics on job satisfaction, classroom climate and teacher retention will be compared between those teachers receiving conflict resolution education training and teachers receiving only traditional methods of teacher preparation. Preliminary research suggests that the study will show positive correlations between conflict resolution education training and teacher effectiveness.

4. Investing in a Peaceful School

A. Funding

The concept of training teachers in dispute resolution theory raises concerns of costs, not only financially but also costs in time and energy. The question of funding is always a problem in schools. Public schools, especially those in low-income communities, face difficult decisions when allocating school funds for resources. Therefore, a foreseeable hurdle in implementing a dispute resolution system requiring additional training and professional development for teachers would be the costs of the program. Preservice training in conflict management would be absorbed into tuition costs for new teacher and would not affect current school budgets. However, the continuing development of conflict management skills and the training of current teachers and administrators, as well as any materials the school might need to reinforce conflict management theory inside the classroom, would take school funds. In addition, training for school staff would take time away from other activities.

Funding for conflict resolution education programs lies in grants, free services from non-profit organizations, and the development of an efficient conflict resolution education plan that could be maintained at low cost over time. A resource guide produced by The Ohio Commission on Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management directs schools interested in conflict resolution education to seek funding not only within existing school budgets, but also from community foundations, civic groups, parent groups, local businesses and state and federal programs.

Some schools have received funding for their conflict resolution education programs by taking part in research studies. In 1994-1995, 132 Ohio elementary schools received small grants of $1,500.00 from The Ohio Commission on Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management for the purpose of building conflict resolution programs in their schools. 78 percent of the 115 schools that responded to the study reported that they had seen improvement in classroom management, with 65 percent reporting a decrease in the amount of time teachers spent dealing with student conflicts. Other schools are fortunate enough to be in the geographical vicinity of established community conflict resolution programs, such as the Resolving Conflict Creatively Program which serves 60 New York public schools. The RCCP program is a comprehensive K-12 conflict resolution and violence prevention program which was evaluated by the National Center for Children in Poverty. The 1999 NCCP report stated that there was a significant positive impact when teachers taught a high number of RCCP lessons and those children receiving high numbers of lessons showed greater academic achievement and higher ratings on positive social behaviors than children receiving low numbers of lessons or no lessons at all.

Schools have also received funding directly from the state. The Office of the Attorney General in Massachusetts operates a program called SCORE: Student Conflict Resolution Experts, which creates and funds student mediation initiatives. The program was created in 1989 and has since trained more than 5,000 students. Although not all states have programs designed specifically for conflict resolution education, schools may be able to receive funding from their state's Safe and Drug-Free Schools programming funds. The Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools is the department of the U.S. Department of Education designed to contribute to the prevention of violence and drug-use in our nation's schools. Funding is provided to each school to support anti-drug and anti-violence initiatives.

When considering the financial burdens associated with implementing a conflict resolution education program, it is important to also consider the costs of not having such a program, especially in connection with teacher attrition rates. A report prepared for Renewing Our Schools, Securing our Future: A National Task Force on Public Education studied the current expenditures of Ohio schools. The report found that there was a strong connection between student behavior and teacher job satisfaction. The report noted that teachers often receive pay increases as compensation when expected to work in unsatisfactory job conditions. Assuming that positive student behavior could be raised by only ten percent, the report equated that difference with a three percent increase in pay for all teachers. Considering that there are 119,954 teaches in Ohio with an average pay of 45,414 dollars, this compensating wage differential of three percent would be worth 46.41 million dollars.

The report also looked at teacher turnover, finding that 9 percent of the teaching staff in Ohio changes per year. That means that 10,796 teachers will need to be replaced each year and the cost of turnover is equal to 33 percent of the salary of the new hire, resulting in an expenditure of 161.79 million dollars annually. Raising the rate of teacher attrition would therefore have great economical benefits for the state, as these costs would be lowered and the funds could be distributed more efficiently. Finally, the report noted that Ohio schools spend over 83 million dollars annually on school safety, not including the time teachers and principals spend monitoring student conflict.

B. Time

The conservation of time is an important economic benefit of conflict resolution education. Although some school costs necessitating a dip into the school's budget would likely be incurred in the implementation of a conflict resolution education program, the time saved on discipline would free up hours for administrators and teachers. A 1996 study estimated that 40 to 60 percent of class time was spent on disciplinary matters, rather than instruction. An Ohio study in which the schools were given grant money to develop a conflict resolution program resulted in 70 percent of teachers reporting that the conflict management program had reduced the amount of time they spent on student discipline.

Research performed by David Johnson and Roger Johnson in more than sixty junior and senior high schools found similar results. These studies examined the results of the Teaching Students to Be Peacemakers program and found that after negotiation and mediation training the frequency of student conflicts which needed teacher intervention decreased by 80 percent. The same study found that the number of conflicts referred to the principal dropped to nearly zero. The teachers and principles interviewed conceded that they had reservations about the amount of time and energy it took to implement the program, but expressed without qualification that they would continue the training in the future. Therefore, although there are costs to be considered, the value of time must be noted when considering the benefits of the program.

Costs would decrease as the program progressed because school materials could be recycled for the following years and the initial trainings would dwindle down into "check-ups" for the teachers' conflict management skills, assuming that all teachers had received either pre-service conflict management training or had attended basic training sessions. Teachers could also encourage each other and motivate their students to use conflict management practices, leading to a school climate friendly towards dispute resolution. Pre-service teachers who realize the practical nature of the skills of conflict management in the classroom are more likely to later support initiatives that can foster their professional development in these skills. Effectively implementing the program in the beginning should create a "snowball" effect until dispute resolution skills are as commonplace inside the classroom as spelling bees or story problems.

5. Would it make a difference?

A. A Critical View

Conflict resolution education is a highly debated issue. Supporters of conflict resolution in schools were disappointed by the Surgeon General's 2001 report, which stated, "Some educational programs that target universal populations have shown a consistent lack of effort in scientific studies. Peer-led programs, including peer counseling, peer mediation and peer leaders are among them. In a 1987 review of these interventions, Gottfredson concluded that there is no evidence of a positive effect." This report has often been quoted as proof that conflict resolution skills are not an effective tool when combating the problems faced in education. However, there are three reasons, noted by Tricia Jones in a 2002 editor's note, why this report should not disqualify the inclusion of conflict resolution education as a solution to the teacher retention crisis.

The first reason is that the study only looked to the effectiveness in preventing acts of serious violence. The public's interest has focused on school violence in reaction to a series of deadly school conflicts, the most notable being the shootings at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. However, scholars note that aggravated assaults and weapons-related violence, while important, make up only a small percentage of school conflicts. According to National Center for Educational Statistics for 1999-2000, only 4.8 percent of teachers reported that physical fighting among students was a serious problem in their school, while 17.2 percent felt that disrespect for teachers was a serious problem and 40.9 percent felt that student misbehavior interfered with creating constructive learning environments. Although violence prevention is a possible result of conflict resolution education, it is not the goal. Rather, conflict resolution education is designed to promote an understanding of conflict and the skills required to process problem solving actions.

It would be unfair to judge the field of conflict resolution education by studying only one possible effect. In fact, the benefits of a successfully implemented conflict resolution education program can be seen in many different statistics for student behavior and academic achievement, depending on the results which represent the goals of the school. One elementary school in Ohio collected data over a period of three years, noting not only the rates of student fighting, but also changes in office referrals, suspensions, students on the Honor Roll, students with perfect attendance, and general student achievement.

The second reason that the Surgeon General's report is unreliable is that the study upon which the Surgeon General was relying is outdated. A large amount of research has come forward in the last twenty years which supports conflict resolution education and this research should be considered. Finally, even if the study was valid twenty years later, it would only apply to peer mediation, which is merely a component of conflict resolution education. As discussed earlier, peer mediation can be a valuable tool for cultivating dispute resolution skills in youth, but used independently it is an inappropriate substitute for a comprehensive conflict resolution education approach. Focusing solely on peer mediation misses the larger potential of the program. This report cannot be used to discount conflict resolution education in its entirety.

B. Support

Research promoting the benefits of conflict resolution education was collected in a set of five research papers, available to the public as a book titled, Does it Work: The Case for Conflict Resolution Education in our Nation's Schools. The book is the result of a 2000 symposium held by the Conflict Resolution Education Network which gathered educators, practitioners, researchers and other professionals interested in the field of conflict resolution education. The research presented at the symposium reported that conflict resolution education results in a number of benefits to the schools, including significant improvements in interpersonal and intergroup relationships, reductions in violence and aggressiveness, increased cooperation among students and the fostering of positive attitudes towards school. These benefits and the many other benefits claimed would lead to a decrease in time spent managing classroom disruptions, thus decreasing one of the leading factors named as a problem by teachers leaving the profession. If the reports are correct, it would appear that the inclusion of conflict resolution education would therefore increase teacher retention.

C. The Chance of Success

Finally, there is one more reason supporting the inclusion of conflict resolution education as a solution to the nation's teacher retention crisis. Schools are running out of options. Faced with a quickly growing divide between the number of students in attendance and the number of teachers in the field, schools will only be able to manage the crisis effectively if they are flexible and creative in their approach to education. The implementation of conflict resolution education requirements across the board would be a relatively low cost solution and has the possibility of providing long term benefits with major impact on job satisfaction, school climate, and the creation of a positive school experience for every student. It seems that anything with this much research behind it and this much possibility, in a time where schools are faced with such an overwhelming problem, would be worth a try.

School-specific research studies and geographically limited community programs are not enough to single-handedly solve the teacher retention crisis. In order to determine whether or not conflict resolution education is actually a workable solution to the falling rates of teacher attrition, conflict resolution education should be a requirement for teachers across the board, beginning with pre-service education. Until the program is established not only in privileged schools and distinct communities, but also in urban and rural schools with a high risk of academic failure, it will be impossible to determine if this initiative is truly effective. In the best case scenario, the universal implementation and execution of conflict resolution education programs in every school across the nation could create a generation of peaceful citizens skilled in managing conflicts and communicating effectively. Worst case scenario, only a few schools will truly benefit and the rest will continue to wait for a solution, having been temporarily inconvenienced by the implementation of the program. Therefore, the benefits of implementing this additional licensing requirement appear to far outweigh the potential harms.

D. An Argument for Peace

Peace is not a natural state. Conflict and even violence are a part of human existence and it is natural to expect that children will encounter some form of conflict in their childhood. The natural inclination of humans towards conflict is not an argument against conflict resolution education, however, but rather further proof that these types of programs are crucial to the development of children. Because peace is not natural it must be taught. Our advancement as a society depends upon the cultivation of traits which rise above those instincts we are born with. Compassion, empathy, cooperation and self-control are skills which lay the foundation for optimal citizenship, not only for the child's existence and performance in the school but also for their experiences later in society. Conflict resolution education arms children with the ability to flourish as competent adults and conscientious citizens.

Although some will argue that conflict resolution education takes time away from the "real" things a child should be learning, such as English, math, science and history, character education should not be viewed as an impediment to these traditional studies. In fact, based on the research discussed throughout the paper, studies have shown that the increase in available class time due to lowered student conflicts and heightened communication skills actually frees up time for other subjects and enhances the learning atmosphere, thus making the classroom a more fertile environment for academic achievement.

In addition, curriculum integration would take these traditional studies and force students to think critically about the ways these abstract notions actually affect their lives. A lecture on the Holocaust will not have as great an impact as a simulation in which students are forced to consider the attitudes of bullying and social cruelty in reference to the atrocities carried out by the Nazis on the Jewish population. The connection of an abstract historical situation with a common playground conflict will resonate more soundly with a classroom of children than a few pages in a textbook ever could. Therefore, those people who are cautious about the costs of sacrificing valuable time for "real" lessons should support an initiative which would have the greater impact and thus provide a true education.

6. Conclusion

Research indicates that making conflict resolution education a pre-service training requirement for new teachers will lead to better classroom management and higher teacher retention. This is conditionally dependent on the pre-service training being supported by additional measures designed to create a peaceful school atmosphere, such as school-wide events and extra-curricular alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, such as peer mediation. Using pre-service training as a tool to combat falling teacher retention rates is an economical and practical plan and will have long term benefits that may impact the nation's educational design as a whole, making cultures of low tolerance for conflict and violence the status quo inside K-12 schools. Conflict resolution training should be a requirement for teacher licensing in every state and these skills should be supported by school communities which encourage the fostering and application of conflict resolution methods.