Breast cancer tried to halt Connie Booth's life plan, a plan that brought the high school English teacher back into the classroom in her late 40s after she had taken a long hiatus to raise three children.

In April 2004, in the middle of her third year at Mt. Lebanon High School, Booth noticed a slight change in her left breast that turned out to be breast cancer.

It was shocking and devastating news that Booth felt she had to share with her 10th- and 11th-grade English students. She wanted to be instructive, but not frightening, open, but not graphic, about the realities of the disease,

"I told them right away. I had them all year and sort of got attached to them. I didn't want them to hear whispers in the hallway," said Booth, 51, who lives in Bethel Park and never quit teaching through her treatments.

"I wanted this to be a learning experience," she said.

As things turned out, Booth the teacher has learned some extraordinary lessons from her students, lessons about kindness, about the ability of teenagers to perform selfless acts.

"Their response was stunning," Booth said. "Kids came in with cards, with flowers. I had one boy give me a dozen yellow roses."

When Booth finished her chemotherapy, students filled a classroom with hundreds of paper cranes, Asian symbols of longevity.

The paper cranes are reminders of the story of a 12-year-old Japanese girl named Sadako who developed leukemia after the bombing of Hiroshima. She remembered the Japanese legend that anyone folding 1,000 paper cranes is granted a wish and set out to do this.

The culmination of the Mt. Lebanon students' affection for their English teacher is the Booth Brigade, an organized group that will be walking or running in Sunday's Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation Pittsburgh Race for the Cure. The race, now in its 13th year, always is held on Mother's Day at Schenley Park.

Two juniors, Alice Ely and Shira Mahler, organized the effort with the help of two sophomores, Marian Pearson and Abby Uddstrom.

Through their efforts, about 160 people who participate in Sunday's race will be wearing white and pink Booth Brigade sweatbands. The Booth Brigade raised more than $2,500 and won the race's high school challenge for the most pledges.

"We are going to dress in pink" Ely said, and make a scrapbook for Booth, who also will be walking in the race with family and friends.

"The work they have done in my name is overwhelming," Booth said. "I am so honored, but I am also so humbled by this."

"We are in this age where everyone criticizes teenagers. I honestly don't know that there are bad teenagers," Booth said.

Previous to this effort, Ely and Mahler had started a Big Sisters club for girls at the high school that pairs younger female students with older ones as a way to promote bonding.

"We found out [about Booth's cancer] last spring, so over the summer, we thought of stuff we could do," Ely said.

She said they decided to run the Race for the Cure.

Working with Betsy Henderson, director of student activities, students set up Booth Booths during lunch periods at the high school. They had class breakfasts.

They passed out fliers in home rooms, spoke at student council meetings, had registration at the Mt. Lebanon Recreation Center.

For Booth, the students' initiative has been part of her healing process. Last week, she had a mammogram and ultrasound that were clear.

Now in her fourth year at Mt. Lebanon, Booth had taught in Peters when she was young, but quit after she had three children: Ryan, now 20; Shannon, 19; and Brendan, 16. Her husband, John, has taught for 35 years at Peters Township High School.

One lesson Booth wants to teach from her experiences is that breast cancer doesn't always come in lumps.

There was no history of breast cancer in her family and she had gotten mammograms for 10 years, but the tests didn't detect the cancer in its early stages.

In April 2004, she noted a change in her breast. Initially, her gynecologist didn't think anything was wrong. An early mammogram, followed by an ultrasound, proved otherwise.

"It was pretty shocking. Really. Truly. This was the last thing I thought I would get. Breast cancer is not in my family," said Booth, who ended up having a mastectomy of her left breast June 9, followed by a second surgery in which her lymph nodes were removed.

She continued to work as much as she could while undergoing eight rounds of chemotherapy over 24 weeks, and 37 radiation treatments every day for 7¹/₂ weeks. During the chemo, she suffered several complications including a blood clot and an infection.

"I finished radiation in March," said Booth, who is now taking Tamoxifen.

"Hopefully, I am done," said Booth who is looking forward to walking with her husband and children this Sunday in the Komen Pittsburgh Race for the Cure.

"It is funny. I had a Girl Scout troop for 12 years and always thought we should do this, but we never did," she said.

"This is my first time."