Contemplative Practices and Education: Feb. 11-13, 2005

We must make peace in ourselves if we are to make peace in the world.--The Dalai Lama

Dear Friends,

We are pleased to invite you to participate in a national conference on Contemplative Practices and Education: Making Peace in Ourselves and in the World. The conference will be held at Teachers College, Columbia University, February 11-13, 2005. It promises to be a remarkable event and we hope that you will be able to join us.

Here are some conference highlights:

Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of Wherever You Go, There You Are and Full Catastrophe Living, will provide the keynote presentation

Workshops by leading educators on how they have integrated contemplative practices into their own classrooms

Guided meditations drawn from diverse traditions around the world (these meditations are integrated into the conference program to demonstrate how they can be used to transform the environment in which communication takes place)

Artistic performances grounded in diverse contemplative practices
(his schedule permitting, Robert Thurman, former Buddhist monk and close friend of the Dalai Lama, will introduce the performances and explore the relations between the arts and contemplative practices)

Representing the Peace Education Center at Teachers College, we will explore how contemplative practices can be more effectively integrated into peace education. Of special concern is how these practices can be used to sustain mindfulness among those who work for peace as they address issues of war, violence, and social justice in a highly charged political context.

For more information on the conference program and registration, please visit the three centers that support the conference:

The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society
www.contemplativemind.org/programs/academic/conference

The Peace Education Center, Teachers College
www.tc.edu/peaceed/contemplative-practices.htm

The Center for Educational Outreach and Innovation at Teachers College
www.tc.edu/ceoi

The last two centers provide information about how to register for a 1-credit course connected to the conference in which students explore various materials on the relations between contemplative practices and peace education. If you have further questions about registration, please contact Jocelyn Smith at jsmith@tc.columbia.edu

We look forward to welcoming you to Teachers College in February.
Janet Gerson, Clifford Hill, Tony Jenkins
Conference Coordinators
Peace Education Center
Teachers College - Box 171
Columbia University
New York, New York 10027
tel: (212) 678-8116 fax: (212) 678-8237
web: www.tc.edu/PeaceEd