I go beyond my comfort zone, listen to other's perspectives and experiences, and act on what I really desire. I have always had empathy for teens and children who live without safety, belonging, or security, and objected to injustice and neglect. With co-founder Giovanna Taormina, we've partnered with thousands of men, women, and teens and trained on the circle model with others who share this commitment to turn systems, institutions, and environments away from inadequate and ineffective structures, and to stand up for and provide opportunities for good relationships. Teens and adults respond immediately to safe and caring connections. The Boys Council approach is a natural extension of what's already begun with Girls Circle. Facilitators working with boys: bringing consistency, offering safe and considerate choices, believing in boys' and girls' wise and fun capacities, challenging unsafe, abusive, violent, or disrespectful conditions. It's been working. Girls say "We love Girls Circle because we get to talk", and "Nobody puts anybody down here; I can open up and be real." Boys say "I hope we have more Boys Council groups" and "I found out I wasn't so different from other dudes." Change begins with a the actions of showing up and listening in safe places.
Oakland A's baseball games with my son and husband; hiking Mt. Tam toward the top or over toward the Pacific Ocean; driving over the Golden Gate Bridge and viewing San Francisco and the Bay Area; being with my parents and all of their 28 grandchildren; listening to the choir at St. Andrew's Church in Marin City.
It's the Bay Area!
I want young men -and young women- to find healthy and safe connections within their communities, and, in doing so, to realize: their inherent worth, their individual and collective strength and power to find pathways into sustainable lives and livelihoods, to resist oppressive forces, to reject violence while standing up for rights, respect, and relationships. I want boys and young men to experience strengths in their connections as a community, the foundation for hope.
Providing adolescent groups and counseling with youth and families since 1987, I co-founded Girls Circle Association with our Executive Director, Giovanna Taormina, in 1997. The Girls Circle model is a premier, female responsive group approach to promote resiliency in adolescent girls. Our program is a "promising approach" and we are consultants to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency prevention. I authored a chapter on Peer Relationships and the Girls Circle program in the Handbook of Prevention and Intervention Programs for Adolescent Girls, 2008, C. LeCroy (Ed.). While continuing to facilitate a Girls Circle at a local continuation high school, I am coordinating pilot studies of the Boys Council program and serve on the development team to create the forthcoming Boys Council Facilitator Training for launch in Fall, 2008. I have the great blessing to be parent of an adolescent young man and two grown daughters.
