by Eddie Vegger

Created on: January 02, 2009

Congratulations on your desire to learn basic mediation skills! If you choose to go beyond the basics, you can become a certified mediator and provide a tremendously useful service to your community. If you stop after learning the basics, you will still walk away with ideas and skills that can help you in almost every area of your life.

You can pay a lot of money for a basic mediation skills course, but you don't have to. The place to start is with a Google search using the key words "dispute resolution center." Dispute Resolution Centers (DRCs) are non-profit organizations devoted to helping communities resolve conflict. Sometimes they are located in major cities, but they also can be found in smaller rural areas. Once you have located the DRC nearest you, contact them and find out when the next basic mediation course is scheduled. There may be a fee involved, but it will be nominal, usually just enough to pay for the training expenses. On average, you can expect to shell out between $150.00 and $300.00 for a week long course. When you go through the course and see the amount of effort it takes to train 10-15 new mediators for a week, the cost will probably make sense to you.

You wil learn the importance and limitations of confidentiality in the mediation process. You wil learn the mediators role, which is one of an impartial facilitator, not an advocate or judge. Meditators coach the parties in conflict and help them reach their own solutions. You will learn the difference between mediation and other methods of conflict resolution such as arbitration. The role of the parties is sure to be a topic of training as well. Mediators encourage people to negotiate in good faith, to keep an open mind and to consider a range of options beyond the ideas they bring with them to mediation. Mediators are taught to observe people closely and to be aware of imbalances of power or attempts to be manipulative. If mediators sense that unhealthy situations are developing, they are trained to stop the mediation, caliing for a caucus or in some cases, ending the mediation completely.

Most DRC's teach an eight stage mediation process, and mediators are usually trained to work in teams of two. Before the mediation begins, mediators provide an opening statement describing confidentiality, roles and the process. Disputants and mediators sign an agreement to mediate, which states that the participants understand the process and are wiling to negotiate in good faith, observing the rules

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