The Dispute Resolution Center has over 130 trained volunteer mediators who conduct over 500 mediations a year donating over 1100 hours of professional time. They represent a great many professional and community backgrounds including attorneys, educators, social service and health professionals, community leaders and more. For every conflict, our staff carefully chooses a mediation team of one or two mediators whose education and experience most closely match the issues and the people involved in the conflict.
Our mediators are a reflection of the diverstiy in our community in terms of race, gender, age, ethnic identitiy, sexual orientation and cultural background and strive to embody and model the very traits of peaceful resolution of conflict the DRC strives to fulfill.
Qualifications:
Mediators must meet the following basic requirements:
- 40 hour Michigan State Court Administrative Office (SCAO) approved
- 10 hours observation and practice
- Co-mediation practice with experienced Mediators
Specialized Qualifications: Mediators must meet the following specialized training requirements for those cases involving:
- Divorce & Custody
- Domestic Violence screening protocols
- Special Education
- Parent/Teen
- Truancy
- Adult & Child Guardianship
Quality Control
- Co-mediation
- Most DRC cases are assigned 2 mediators who can work together to balance and monitor consistency and effectiveness of their work
- Debrief after each Mediation
- The DRC staff meets with the mediators after every case to discuss the effectivenss of the mediators and the outcomes
- Written evaluations by DRC clients
- All clients are provided evaluation forms to be filled out immediately following each mediation and these are reviewed by the Executive Director and staff