This is the first of three blog posts, at the end of the academic year, by Mary Triggiano, director of Marquette University Law School’s Andrew Center for Restorative Justice. These stories are also available on the Marquette Law School blog.
One of the greatest privileges of teaching the Restorative Justice Workshop at Marquette Law School is watching students deepen not only as future lawyers but as human beings.
Law school asks a great deal of students. It teaches discipline, analytical rigor, advocacy, precision and resilience. Those are essential skills, and I deeply value legal education and the extraordinary faculty and experiences our students encounter throughout their journey. But alongside intellectual growth, many students are also trying to hold onto something more personal: their sense of purpose, humanity and connection to the people behind the cases.
This semester, one student’s final reflection captured that tension with remarkable honesty. I relate this with full permission even as I have elected not to attribute it.
The student wrote that coming into her final semester of law school, she felt as though she had “lost something.” This was not because law school had failed her, but because the pace and pressure of achievement can sometimes narrow our focus. She described becoming consumed by reading, outlining, internships and the next assignment until she no longer felt connected to the “bigger picture of what it all meant.”
Then she encountered restorative justice.
The student’s final project in our workshop centered on a restorative justice circle for women in litigation. What began as an academic project evolved into something far more personal and transformative. She reflected on how the circle illuminated the subtle but deeply felt experiences many women navigate in the legal profession, such as interruptions, second-guessing and differing perceptions of confidence and competence.
But what moved me most was not simply what she learned about the profession. It was what she learned about listening, humanity, and the limits of the traditional “fix-it” mindset many lawyers carry.
At one point she wrote:
“Restorative justice is not always about fixing something immediately, but about recognizing that something exists in the first place.”
That insight captures so much of what restorative justice invites us to do.
In the legal profession, we are often trained to move quickly toward solutions, conclusions, and outcomes. Restorative justice does not reject accountability or resolution — but it reminds us that healing and understanding often begin before resolution. Sometimes people first need space to speak honestly about their experiences and know that someone is truly listening.
The student described struggling with the uncertainty of that process. She admitted that she initially wanted the circle to feel “complete.” She wanted clear outcomes. She wanted participants to leave with a sense that something had been definitively resolved. Instead, she left with discomfort. And then, slowly, she realized that the discomfort itself carried meaning.
One circle participant later shared that the conversation helped her understand experiences she had previously dismissed. Another participant left feeling newly determined to advocate for herself professionally. The student began to understand that restorative justice is not always measured by tidy outcomes or immediate repair. Sometimes the impact lives in quieter places such as in recognition, validation, reflection, dignity or a subtle shift in how someone sees themselves.
She wrote beautifully about this tension between outcome and process:
“People felt different because they did not have to win. People were included. People were heard.”
That line stayed with me.
So much of modern life, and certainly of litigation, conditions people to believe they must prevail, persuade, defend or perform. Restorative justice creates a different kind of space. A space where people do not need to “win” in order to matter. A space where listening itself becomes meaningful.
Another passage that deeply resonated with me was the student’s reflection that restorative justice “is a process that allows people to see themselves more clearly.” I have seen that happen again and again in this workshop. Students come into the course expecting to learn about restorative justice. What they often do not anticipate is how much they will learn about themselves. Through circles, dialogues, community experiences and encounters with survivors, incarcerated individuals, violence interrupters and community leaders, students begin to understand that the law lives inside real human stories. They also begin to understand their own voice, fears, assumptions and values more clearly.
This student reflected candidly on her own self-doubt. She questioned whether she belonged in the room, whether she was “good enough,” whether she deserved to occupy space in the profession. Her honesty about those feelings was powerful, especially because so many students quietly carry similar questions.
And yet, over the course of the semester, she also began to reclaim confidence. It was not confidence rooted in having every answer, but confidence rooted in presence, listening, humility and authenticity. She wrote:
“I became less focused on being right, and more focused on understanding.”
As a professor, that sentence means a great deal to me.
Legal education rightly teaches students to analyze, advocate and think critically. But alongside those skills, I hope students also leave with the capacity to sit with complexity, to listen without immediately preparing a rebuttal and to recognize the humanity behind conflict and harm.
One of the most meaningful moments in her reflection came near the end, when she wrote that somewhere along the way in law school, she had stopped thinking about the “bigger picture,” and that this class “gave that back to me.”
She was talking about purpose.
That reflection reminded me why experiential restorative justice education matters so deeply. Students do not simply read about empathy, accountability, harm or healing. They practice it. They struggle with it. They sit inside uncertainty. They learn that not every human experience can be reduced to a legal issue to solve.
And they begin to see that being a good lawyer is not only about intelligence or argument. It is also about presence, curiosity, integrity and courage. The willingness to truly hear another person’s story.
Perhaps my favorite line in her paper was this:
“This class taught me that not everything will be resolved cleanly. That there are situations where listening is more important than solving, and where understanding is more important than being right.”
That insight reflects the very heart of restorative justice.
And honestly, it reflects the kind of lawyer, and human being, our world desperately needs.
