I remember an eighth grade group I would have deemed “not ready for council.”  I had done poetry councils with my students for many years, but 1994 was the first year the program moved into all eighth grade language arts classes.  Students were learning how to be in councils that focused strictly on the listening and speaking standards in the curriculum.  And we teachers were learning how to navigate the territory between classroom teacher and council facilitator.
    While Camille stayed in my room with half of my students, every Friday for the last month and a half I took the other half, what I considered the tougher bunch, down the steps, through the hall, out the doors, to the auditorium where we met in the carpeted foyer.
    In this first year of the program involving eighth graders, we only had one semester for council, and this was the eighth session, the halfway point.
    As we left the classroom, I noticed that the pace was slower than usual.  As a devotee of council, aware of what little time we had to practice, I felt agitated to find that my students didn’t share my enthusiasm.  As we walked through the hall, when I turned around to look, I noticed the group had spread itself long and thin.  I stopped to gather them.  “Come on. Let’s go.  We only have fifty minutes.”   A flash for me.  Perhaps an eternity for them.  But I wasn’t thinking about them.  I wanted to get to the council and watch my carefully crafted lesson unfold. 
     They dutifully clump near the library.  “C’mon, guys, let’s get there so we can get started.”  I tell James to lead the way so I can bring up the rear.  Even with my shepherding, the clump thins into scraggly line and I have to urge them forward as if to their doom. 
     To make things worse, several pairs of students are talking and laughing loudly.  Only James, our entrusted leader, forges ahead toward the auditorium.  I don’t want other teachers and classes to be disturbed, and I can’t see what could be more important than arriving at the space where we could do our meaningful work together.  And what could possibly be funny about this!  My posture stiffening, my gait quickening, my attitude shifting from open hearted council facilitator to martyr to the cause, I said, “Let’s move it people!”
     I’m beginning to feel that perhaps I, too, don’t want to sit as an equal in this circle.  Better perhaps to call it off and return to the classroom for a little sentence combining worksheet.  Done in silence!
But here we are.  Finally in the foyer.  And no one is sitting down.  They know that when we arrive we start setting out the mats, and then we sit in the circle and begin.  Instead, students are spread around the boxcar shaped room, some in small groups, others alone, leaning against walls, sitting on tables.  Some still seem to be enjoying themselves, laughing or talking.  I am not enjoying myself.
      I begin to set the mats in a circle, and I ask James to help.  He does so still in the glow of my trust.  A couple of others grab a mat and sit.
     I give the command, “Everyone into the circle!”  Slowly, grudgingly, they obey.  Some sit sideways.  Some move their mats just slightly out of the perimeter.  No one wants to be here.
     All sense of compassion vanishes.  I am an angry, isolated leader in a group of uncaring, stupid, cynical teenagers.  “What is going on here?  I’m trying to get you guys to our council space, and you’re all lagging and lolling, hanging back, taking your time.  This is a part of our class!  Council is a part of English class.  We’re trying to learn how to talk and listen to each other in a new way.  And you guys don’t get it.  You don’t see what a great opportunity you have here.  People don’t know how to tell the truth to each other.  Nobody listens.  And we have a chance to do it here, and you guys are blowing it!”
     They are all looking at me now.  The talking has stopped.  “Look, if you have something you want to tell me, go ahead.  Let’s start the council and say whatever you want, and I’ll listen to you, and I won’t interrupt you, and I won’t kick you out.  I had a plan.  I had something really interesting for us to talk about.  I thought about it very carefully, but now I don’t think there’s enough time.  So, if you’ve got the guts, go ahead and say whatever it is you have to say!  I’ll put the talking piece in the center.  Anyone who wants to start can take it.”
     I’m fuming.  Why do I even try?  These kids don’t care.  I don’t care.  What a waste of everyone’s time.
     Elisio, sitting just to my left, takes the stick, decorated with some initials, tag names, and a band aid.  He settles onto his mat and begins.  “Provisor, you think you’re such a hard ass.”  He looks to see if I’m going to keep my promise.  I give him an expressionless, unchanging gaze.  He continues, “You’re always on my case.  ‘Where’s your homework.  Get in your seat.  Quit talking.’  Then you come in here and try to act all cool.  Sometimes I’d like to just punch you in the face!”
     He hands the talking piece to Mario who passes it to Anthony.  “You’re always giving us so much work.  I don’t like to do work.  You think we’re supposed to be really smart or something.  Then you get down on us when we don’t get it.”  He passes the piece to Tranee.
     “Yeah, I agree with Elisio.  You try to be so hard.  Like you know what we’re thinking.  Sometimes I don’t want to talk in council.  I don’t care about this.”
     The piece comes around.  Some pass.  Many seem to agree to degrees with Elisio’s assessment.  One student gets the piece.  It might have been James.  He says, tersely, “Oh, I think Provisor’s alright.”  A few heads nod in tacit agreement.
     Now it’s my turn.  “Do you guys have any idea what it’s like to prepare lessons that I think are really going to help you out, skills that you’ll need later in life, and to have you come in with no homework, no supplies, no handout that I just put in your hand yesterday?  And to have you talking and messing around while I’m trying to tell you what I think you need to know.  It’s hard.  I give you hard work because I believe you can do it.  Some of you don’t even try.”
     Again, Elisio tests the waters, tests my promise, tests the circle.  He has a few more names to call me.  He doesn’t care that I have to work hard.  It’s my job and I get paid for it.  He has to come to school, and he gets nothing but boredom and a hard time. 
     The piece goes around the whole circle twice.  More students are passing.  Several repeat what they said before, for emphasis.  Sensing that I’ve taken a few hits, a few join James in mild approval of my performance.  I continue to complain.  I’m sulking.  This isn’t going anywhere either.  Perhaps this is the last council.  I think it, but I don’t say it.
     Still time for another round.  Elisio launches, “You want to know what I’m really afraid of?  I’m afraid I won’t live to be eighteen.  You come to my neighborhood and see how people die.  You keep telling me I have to do this and that so I can get a job when I grow up.  I’m afraid I’ll be dead before I grow up!”
     He passes the talking piece to Mario, dropping it hard into Mario’s upturned palm, the dot under the exclamation point.  Mario speaks for the first time.  “I’m afraid everybody in my family is going to die.  My brother’s in jail, and sometimes my sister doesn’t come home.”
      “I’m afraid my parents are going to split.  They fight all the time.  It seems like they never talk to each other anymore.  They’re always yelling.”
      “There are lots of drugs in my neighborhood.  I know where these guys are that sell them.  I have to walk the long way through the alley if I want to stay away from them.  And I don’t like walking in the alley.”
     And so it goes, each student, unprompted, sharing what is probably the thing that makes school a place to let go of the fear and to be their goofy, innocent, selfish, loving selves, perhaps the only place where they can play and mess around.  And even council, with the formality of its circle, the talking piece, one person speaking at a time, everyone required to listen, reminds them of the visceral tightness of the neighborhood outside. 
     I feel the waves of sensation, sinuses and tear ducts activated, my heart breaking open to create space for the suffering of children.  A minute or so left.  I get the talking piece.  “Thank you.  Thank you for helping me understand who you are.  You all spoke from the heart.  I’m honored to sit in council with you.  If it’s okay, I’d like to come back next week.”
     A few smiles.  A few nods.  We’ll be back next week.

                                                             

                                                       *****
     Did I change my expectations?  Did I lighten up on the work? No.  If anything, I found that what these young people were capable of, what they had inside them, was beyond the confines of my expectations.
Council changed, too.  The last seven sessions began promptly, no visitors were allowed, and the lingering, the lolling, and the lagging occurred after the dismissal bell had rung.