Foundational Circle Training-Online

FOUNDATIONAL: This training teaches the basic components of Circle Keeping, as well as give everyone an experience of being in circle. We cover both community building and building safety in a circle, basic processes and prompts. By the end of this training, each student should be ready to hold a simple circle on their own in a safe setting. The attendees of this training will be made up of both Hidden Water volunteer keepers and others who would like to learn circle keeping. Content Warning: This training goes deep, and conversations around trauma may come up. Storong Oak Lefebvre is the Executive Director and co-founder of the Visioning B.E.A.R. Circle Intertribal Coalition, Inc. A co-author of the Walking in Balance with All Our Relations teaching curriculum, Strong Oak, LICSW, has a Masters in Social Service Administration from Case Western Reserve University School of Social Work. She served on the Advisory Council for the National Sexual Resource Center from June 2010 to June 2016. While on the Advisory Council, she was its voting representative to the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape Board of Directors from 2010 to 2013. Strong Oak is currently a Peer Cohort, representing VBCIC, with the Just Beginnings Collaborative, a funding organization that seeks to build a movement to end childhood sexual assault nationwide. Transforming communities to embrace restorative practices in dealing with both those who are victimized and those who have victimized others are important aspects of Strong Oak’s work. She teaches Circle process to communities, agencies, and providers, working with those who are survivors of domestic and sexual violence and those affected directly by homicide as well as those who are working to return to their communities violence-free after having hurt others. Most recently, Strong oak has been appointed by the governor of the State of Massachusetts to serve on the statutory Restorative Justice Advisory Committee for a six- year term beginning November 2018 and lasting until November 2024.