About Will

Will is currently a Professor of Communication in the Isaacson School for Communication, Arts, and Media at Colorado Mountain College where he teaches Interpersonal Communication, Intercultural Communication, and Conflict Management. He holds a doctorate in communication and a master’s degree in religious studies, both from the University of Colorado, Boulder. At CU he taught courses in Conflict Management, Peace & Conflict Studies, and Restorative Justice.

Over the course of the last 25 years, he has facilitated conflict mediation encounters using a range of restorative methods, consulted and conducted training for families, businesses, k12 educators, administrators, and workplaces helping them to implement restorative conflict and conduct policies, practices and programming. 

He is the author of The Restorative Way: Harnessing the Power of Restorative Communication to Mend Relationships, Heal Trauma, and Reclaim Civility One Conversation at a Time (2024). 

Panels, Papers, Publications and Presentations

• In 2004 he was a guest presenter on gender bias at the International Conference on Restorative Practices in Vancouver, Canada. 
• From 2004-2008 he sat on both C.U.’s Standing Committee on Substance Abuse and Office of Discrimination and Sexual Harassment case review board. 
• In 2004 he built one of the nation’s first University-based restorative justice programs authorized to process student crimes occurring off-campus and in the Boulder community. As director, he increased the program’s caseload from 12 per year to over 400 per year.
• In 2008 Will was recognized by C.U.’s Institute for Ethical Civic Engagement for community leadership in developing the University’s Restorative Justice Program which received national acclaim. 
• In 2010 he worked as an environmental restorative justice researcher, writer, and educational consultant for a freshwater lake and reservoir restoration technology project. 
• In 2011 he provided expert testimony for the Colorado State House of Representatives in support of legislation formalizing the practice of restorative mediation in civil cases. 
• In 2012 he was keynote speaker at the Boulder County Community Practice Project charged with unifying correctional and clinical practices for mental health patients. 
• In 2016 he was a guest presenter at the Colorado Conference on Restorative Practices – “Building Restorative Organizational Cultures: Intention, Interaction, and Narrative.” 
• In 2018 he published a series of articles in Mountain Parent Magazine. 
• “Building a Bridge While Navigating Family Conflict: A Restorative Way to Create Connection”
• “Building a Bridge by Forming a Circle: A Restorative Way Through Bullying”
• “Building a Bridge When a Child Seems Unreachable: Looking Through a Restorative Lens to See Beyond a Label”
• In 2019 he published “Restorative School Discipline: It’s about Engagement, not Enforcement” in Connections Quarterly: Vol. XXXIX – Issue 2. The Center for Spiritual and Ethical Education (CSEE)   
• In 2020 he began consulting and mediating conflict resolution for family businesses and workplaces.
• In 2022 he published "The Restorative Way Playbook: a Guide to Restorative Communication Practices" (Bledsoe, 2020).
• In 2024 he published "The Restorative Way: Harnessing the Power of Restorative Communication to Mend Relationships, Heal Trauma, and Reclaim Civility One Conversation at a Time" (Bledsoe, 2025)
• In 2026 he published "The Bully in Me", a chapter in Restorative Justice Up Close: First Person Accounts of an Approach That Works (Wolf, 2026, The New Press).
• He is currently working on a third book: “Restoration in a time of Retribution" [2027]   

Prior to his career in education, Will was an actor in Los Angeles in the 1980s. As a member of the Screen Actors Guild, he appeared as a lead, starring, guest-starring, co-starring and featured actor in films, movies, and episodic television shows such as: In the Heat of the Night (NBC), Matlock (NBC), Midnight Caller (NBC), Adam-12 (Universal Pictures/FOX), Alien Nation (Warner Bros./FOX), Boone (NBC), B. L. Stryker (ABC), Cover-Up (CBS), Dark Side of the Moon (Viacom), Fame (MGM), First and Ten (HBO), Return of the Six Million $ Man (NBC), Two Marriages (ABC), Up the Creek (Orion Pictures), Yellow Rose of Texas (NBC), Summer (CBS), Towheads (NBC), and I Do* (Awarded the Nevada Film Festival Silver Screen Award in 2009).