ABSTRACT
I first hear Janet Connors’s story in a talking circle in 2008. We are in a 10th-grade class at BHS, where teachers in SLC A have been using circles with their weekly advisories to build community. At this point I only know Janet as a fellow from the Center for Restorative Justice who grew up in Boston, comes to the school weekly to keep circles, and has worked in various capacities in the community for nearly 40 years. She is a broad woman, five foot ten, with short, salt-and-pepper hair and bangs that frame gleaming, green-grey eyes and a square, naturally flushed face. She ambles when she walks, her upper body slightly shifting side to side, right hand clutching a copper-colored cane that supports arthritic legs. She looks to be in her late 50s and is wearing a slate-gray T-shirt, gathered black pants, glossy maroon clogs, and several pieces of jewelry: a silver ring with a large, black opal on her left hand, a textured turquoise ring on her right hand, and long strands of amber around her neck. Hers is the only White face in this room of 20 Black, Asian and Latino students.
