Jamaica Plain resident Antonio Castro Aranda, a former immigration lawyer, switched gears years ago to do mediation and conflict resolution work for nonprofits in the Boston area—something he said he was always felt a connection to.
Castro Aranda now volunteers at the Community Dispute Settlement Center (CDSC) in Cambridge, and works for Metropolitan Mediation Services in Brookline. He moved to Jamaica Plain in 2007, where he lives with his wife, who is a teacher at English High School, and his kids, who attend school nearby.
“Everything is there in JP,” he said. “I love the neighborhood.”
He said that when he “transitioned careers” after nearly 15 years as an immigration lawyer, he said that mediation work is “something that I’ve always felt passionate about from when I was much younger.”
He said he has an “inclination to help others communicate in different ways to address difficult situations or challenges,” as well as “facilitate communication that could help or lead to transition from a conflict.”
As an attorney, he said “My training [and] instinct was always to litigate and go to court and things like that.”
He said that when he was exposed to mediation around the year 2000, he thought “Wow, this is really cool, this is really a different process than I was used to. That opened my eyes to look for more opportunities to be trained in mediation.”
He said in 2001, he was first trained by the a mediation and negotiation program at Harvard, where he volunteered as a mediator.
Castro Aranda became involved with CDSC after a friend who was a mediator provided him with a contact at the organization. He reached out and set up a meeting to talk about his eagerness to volunteer with the organization.
“CDSC assists in mediating conflicts including divorce, separation and marital mediation, eldercare, issues related to the LGBTQ community, housing and consumer disputes, neighbors and workplace conflicts,” according to a release.
He eventually got a part time job that allowed him to further delve into the world of mediation, adding that “CDSC opened so many doors for me” by offering things like conflict workshops and training on various different conflict management issues.
He said that although he gets paid to work for Metropolitan Mediation Services, “I offer myself as a volunteer for CDSD,” as “I get such a good vibe from there” and he is grateful for the opportunities they have provided him over the years.
During the pandemic, Castro Aranda said that he and other mediators had to transition their services to Zoom, as did many industries. But prior to COVID, these services were done in person “99.9 percent of the time.”
Mediation requires conversation between people, which naturally lends itself to an in-person setting, but “you have to adjust,” he said. “It’s been a struggle in many ways.”
He said especially with the courts being closed for so long, it was difficult in that respect as well, but now courts are opening up and allowing for Zoom mediation to occur.
He said he and others “went through a period of training to make sure people could do mediation through Zoom.”
Castro Aranda also said that people have been responding well to the virtual mediation sessions.
He added that he is grateful to CDSD for the opportunity to learn and grow as a mediator. “They gave me so many opportunities to learn,” he said, “I want to give to them.”