For RP, my particular process connects people in deep listening circles where individual stories holding inner truth and wisdom can be expressed, excavated, and held in a community of people. Humans having a trustworthy space to share things they may never have spoken before can heal and transform the person, intertwining them in community. Being deeply listened to is a rare gift.

What I bring to promotion of the paradigm is Deep Listening.  Having been nurtured and seasoned for forty-five years among the people who call themselves Quakers and trained in accessing genius and inner resource among marginalized communities in the field of community organizing for thirty-five years, I’ve created a blend of dynamics and practices utilized in a circle process I call Courage & Resiliency. 

We create a trustworthy space for a Focus Person to share an issue or problem, allowing Listeners to support their inner guidance. This method emphasizes agency and sovereignty, ensuring that the Focus Person holds the answers. Key elements are:

1. Trustworthy Space - The circle fosters a safe environment for open sharing.

2. Role of the Focus Person - The Focus Person presents their challenge while Listeners entrust them to their inner guide.

3. Role of the Listener - Listeners deepen  the access of inner-wisdom for the Focus Person by asking open-ended questions withholding judgement, and no advising, fixing, or intervening.

4. Double Confidentiality - a.) What is said here, stays here. b.) No references to the sharing without the Focus Person’s invitation.

5. Eliciting Deep Insight - Thoughtful questions help uncover deeper truths, allowing the Focus Person

As a high school principal, I’ve learned that strong relationships, built on trust, communication, and shared commitment are essential. This belief grew during my time at Coleman Middle School, where building connections with students, families, and staff shaped a positive environment.

I served as principal at Coleman from 2015 to 2020 and as assistant principal at Wichita West High School from 2011 to 2015. Across both roles, I worked with diverse communities and focused on fostering respect, accountability, and belonging.

My strengths include bringing people together, listening, and keeping the focus on what’s best for students.

I enjoy facilitating conversations, mentoring leaders, and helping teams navigate challenges in ways that strengthen relationships. I’m committed to creating school cultures where people feel valued, heard, and accountable.

The mission of the Center for Restorative Communities aligns with my leadership approach. I see restorative practices as a way to build stronger communities by addressing conflict through growth and accountability. I would value the opportunity to contribute my experience and continue learning alongside others in some capacity.

Your school is set up perfectly for the results it is getting.

Restorative Practices is not adding more to your plate. It IS the plate.

The PIC Method – Protection, Intervention, Connection – is a restorative approach to nervous system regulation and neurodiversity. It is based on the fundamental principle that healing occurs through repair, supportive spaces, and individuals developing nervous system capacity and self-advocacy skills to create more peaceful interactions.

            Protection is prioritized first, as a sense of safety is essential for meaningful repair. Intervention is tailored to address the specific circumstances and needs of the individual. Connection forms the foundation of ongoing healing, emphasizing that regulation and restoration are best achieved through relationships and community.

            Kelli Grant developed the PIC Method through over thirty years of experience within criminal justice and community systems, which provided early insight into restorative practices. Additionally, as a late-diagnosed Autistic sociologist, she maintains a core belief: “Individuals are whole, harm stems from systems that are not designed with their needs in mind.” This understanding informs her approach, serving as both a restorative and a clinical perspective.

            Her work integrates sociological thinking, embracing nuanced complexity, with warmth and empathy, supporting individuals through their most challenging moments while also identifying underlying structural patterns. Scientific knowledge and lived experience guide and inform her practice.

            If your work involves engaging with families, educational settings, workplaces, or any individuals whose nervous systems are working tirelessly to adapt to a world not designed for them, Kelli would be pleased to contribute to your efforts.

My CONNECTION to RESTORATIVE PRACTICES is… my lifelong work to create a world in which everyone can feel like they belong and can thrive. 

WHAT I BRING to PROMOTION of the PARADIGM is…a perspective of equity-centered practices, including restorative practices, cultivated through doing the work to create safer, more inclusive schools for over a decade with hundreds of LGBTQ+ advocates across Kansas and the U.S. My leadership consulting expands on that work by taking the same practices into churches, businesses, nonprofits and communities and supporting the implementation and application of the principles to transform systems. My depth of experience facilitating hard conversations is supported by my values of empathy and justice along with the beliefs that everyone has the capacity to learn, grow, change, and thrive, and courage is contagious.

YOU CAN COUNT on ME for… 

• Agency Assessments
• Leadership consulting and coaching
• Program, curriculum or training development
• Client-tailored facilitations, workshops, trainings and presentations
• Public Speaking
• Policy work
• Core Value Integration

My work has centered on building and scaling community-based behavioral health services for populations that are often overlooked or underserved. Through JST Therapy Solutions, I helped build a model that brought peer support into nursing homes and long-term care settings, serving elderly and disabled individuals who were often isolated, disconnected, and in need of meaningful support beyond traditional clinical care. That work

expanded into community-based peer support through Peer Connect.

With ICT Case Management and Side By Side, our focus is at-risk youth, foster care youth, justice-involved youth, and families who are often navigating multiple systems at once. We build partnerships with schools, foster care organizations, juvenile justice, community providers, and trusted messengers who can reach young people in ways traditional systems often cannot.

Through Stability Health Group, we help mission-focused leaders build compliant behavioral health companies that are designed to fill real community gaps. That includes helping leaders structure Medicaid-funded services, develop care models, establish documentation and compliance systems, build referral pathways, and create programs that can serve people effectively while still being sustainable.

For contributing to the CRC POWERHOUSE, the common thread in all of this community work has been relationships, restoration, and filling gaps where systems are not reaching people well enough. I believe deeply in practical community-based solutions, trusted messengers, practical service models, peer support, mentoring, and helping people build programs that are both mission-driven and operationally sound.