The Trainings of Trainers (ToT) has started with a pilot training activity that was held in Mersin on 27 June - 1 July 2022 within the framework of the European Union-Council of Europe Joint Project on “Promoting Alternative Dispute Resolution in Turkey” under Activity 1.5 Developing conciliation training programmes. Representatives of the Directorate General for Criminal Affairs of the Ministry of Justice, local experts with expertise on restorative justice and communication, an international expert with expertise on adult training, as well as the Council of Europe project team attended the training.
Within the scope of this activity, national experts developed training modules and materials (trainers’ and participants’ handbooks) to address the areas and needs identified by the training needs analysis. The following modules were developed: Module 1: Restorative Justice – core principles, historical development and comparison with other models of justice; Module 2: Normative Regulations in Criminal Justice; Module 3: Conciliation Process; Module 4: Fundamental and Ethical Principles for the Conciliator-Disciplinary Law; Module 5: Communication; Module 6: Negotiation; Module 7: Case Study and Practice; Module 8: Training of Conciliation for Bureau Personnel; Module 9: Adult Training.
The training started with a one-day session, delivered by an international expert, on the role and skills of a trainer, methodology for training for adults, as well as communication and presentation skills, while providing the trainers different icebreakers to be used in their upcoming trainings. During the remaining four days of the training, modules were presented by national experts and participants made presentations in groups to exercise what they have learned.
Following this pilot training, organised to test the programme and materials developed, two additional five-day ToT sessions will be conducted in İzmir and Ankara, as a result of which a total of 75 candidate trainers will be trained to take active part as a trainer in the upcoming cascade training activities by the Ministry of Justice. Following the three ToTs, a training report will be prepared to assess the results of the training.
When the ToTs are completed, the training materials (participant’s book and trainer’s book for each module) will be available for the accredited training institutions for use in the trainings. In addition, a pool with a total number of 75 trained trainers will be available for basic training of conciliators.
The training, in general, serves to build the capacity of the trainers to enable them to deliver unified conciliation trainings in a more comprehensive and effective way, by way of the revised programme and materials that are in line with the Ministry’s objective defined in the Human Rights Action Plan (2021) for enhancing the effectiveness and dissemination of the ADR mechanisms (Goal 3.5).
The Joint Project on “Promoting Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) in Turkey” is co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe. The Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Türkiye – Directorate General for Criminals Affairs and Directorate General for Legal Affairs are the end beneficiaries of the Project. The Central Finance and Contracts Unit is the contracting authority.
