Contemplative Education Commons^™

Teachers As Wisdom Workers Of Love: A Radical Reconceptualization Of Teacher Education Centering Wholeness, Compassion, And Interbeing In A Fractured World, Yueyue Wang, Jing Lin, Maha Shoaib, Anna Lytkina

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

Amid global crises and rising teacher burnout, current teacher education often prioritizes technical skills and standardized competencies while neglecting the inner life, relational presence, and spiritual vitality essential for sustaining educators. This article reconceptualizes teacher preparation by envisioning teachers as “wisdom workers of love” -- healers, guides, and community nurturers grounded in wholeness, compassion, and interbeing. Drawing from Daoism, Ubuntu, contemplative pedagogy, and Indigenous epistemologies, this study employs collaborative autoethnography as contemplative inquiry, weaving narratives from educators in China, Pakistan, Russia, and the United States. Through mutual witnessing and collective reflection, we identify five interrelated dimensions for cultivating love-based education: …

Walking Towards Wisdom And Wholeness: Contemplative Education And Punjabi Gang Narratives, Nevan S. Sidhu

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

In this article, I examine how contemplative approaches to education can address the fragmenting nature of the Eurocentric British Columbia (B.C.) K-12 education system and allow for the cultivation of wise and whole human beings. More specifically, I draw upon the experiences of B.C. Punjabi male students who have been subjected to deeply harmful and oppressive gang narratives that have been left unaddressed by current educational approaches. Bringing attention to this issue can allow for alternate paradigms to flourish through contemplative approaches to education that would not only support Punjabi males but also support other marginalized students who find themselves …

A Remembrance Ritual In The Classroom--Death, Middle School, And Contemplative Education, Kari Van Gelder

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

Death is generally unspoken, ignored, and considered too difficult to bring forward into our classrooms. Bringing death to my contemplative pedagogy has been essential for me as a teacher and on behalf of my middle school students. The deepest and most reverential way that we do this in my classroom is through an annual remembrance ritual. On this day, we remember people and pets in our lives who have died. We do inner work through journaling and meditation. The heart of our ritual day involves naming, sharing stories, and deep listening. This reflective essay tells the story of developing this …

Beyond Coping In High School: An Emergent Mindfulness Practice Towards Embodied Wisdom, Mel A.V. Voulgaris

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

Mindfulness practice is trending in schools. Within secondary education, it is oftentimes introduced as meditation for present-moment awareness of the self to support academic concerns. However, mindfulness practice in its original conception is a holistic way of cultivating human well-being towards flourishing. It is a practice that aims for awareness to the entirety of human subjective and intersubjective experiencing as it is emerging. In doing so, mindfulness evolves from a coping tool into a rich contemplative practice. This paper will make the case that mindulness as a contemplative practice facilitates the cultivation of embodied wisdom and that such a practice …

The Wisdom-Centered Classroom: Contemplative Pathways To Healing, Interbeing, And Peace In K–12 Education, Hyeyoung Bang, Jing Lin, Heesoon Bai, Deepa Srikantaiah, Charles Scott, Denise L. Mchugh

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

While contemporary educational goals often prioritize economic advancement and labor-market readiness, a profound need exists to re-center schools as environments that nurture the human spirit. Education should move beyond standardization, cultivating schools where students embrace their inherent worth, relate with empathy and kindness, and develop as compassionate citizens regardless of their background. At the Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education (JCHE), we contend that the cultivation of wisdom must be a primary educational aim. This special issue explores contemplative K–12 pedagogies, inviting experts to examine the realities, possibilities, and systemic challenges of Contemplative Education (CE) from diverse global and Indigenous …

Managing The "Trauma Dump" In Personal Statement Writing, Faith Kurtyka, Amelia Harahap

Feminist Pedagogy

This critical commentary offers methods for helping students who may "trauma dump" in personal statements learn to write their stories for a wide audience in a way that preserves the writer's dignity.

Using Research-Focused Llms, David Farnsworth, Elizabeth Stone

Faculty Presentations on AI

This hands-on workshop introduces university faculty to practical AI tools that support the full academic research workflow, from initial discovery to synthesis and writing. Participants explore the “Big 5” research tools—Perplexity.ai, Scite.ai, Elicit.com, ResearchRabbit, and SciSpace.com—along with Google’s Gemini extensions and NotebookLM, a source-grounded AI designed to analyze uploaded documents while maintaining privacy and providing live citations. The session demonstrates how these tools can accelerate literature reviews, fact-checking, visual mapping of citations, and deep synthesis of complex sources. Faculty also learn strategies for integrating AI responsibly into teaching, including helping students manage bibliographies, using AI for rubric-based feedback, and creating …

Ai Strategies For Effective Teaching & Learning, Dr. Jared Johnston, Prof. Adrian Caraballo

Faculty Presentations on AI

This presentation discusses strategies for effectively integrating artificial intelligence into college classrooms, with a focus on developing AI literacy among students and faculty. Core principles highlight AI as a tool for augmentation rather than replacement, with faculty maintaining oversight while supporting learner preparation, clinical reasoning, and reflective practice. The session stresses the need to rethink course and activity design in the AI era, training students to strategically offload tasks without cognitively offloading thinking. Practical guidance includes questions for intentional integration, experiential learning approaches, and real-world classroom examples from operational leadership courses in which students apply AI within authentic educational leadership …

Ai In The Classroom, Dr. Adrian E. Hinkle, Dr. Amanda Wilson, Dr. Jan H. R. Wörner

Faculty Presentations on AI

This presentation examines how educators can thoughtfully integrate artificial intelligence into the classroom while upholding academic integrity, ethical engagement, and the core mission of education. It draws on historical parallels—from ancient concerns about writing to later fears surrounding typing—to frame AI as a double-edged sword that can offload routine cognitive tasks yet risks eroding the mental discipline and critical thinking essential for deep learning. Centered on the guiding question of what students truly need to learn and how technology can help them achieve it, the session offers practical assignment frameworks, such as designing an AI-supported ministry plan and developing a …

Ai In Scholarship, Dr. Tim Hart

Faculty Presentations on AI

This presentation explores the appropriate role of artificial intelligence in scholarly work, distinguishing between uses that support academic rigor and those that undermine intellectual responsibility. While cautioning against reliance on AI for original argumentation, unverified literature reviews, data interpretation, and normative judgments, it highlights practical applications across the research lifecycle, including ideation, literature exploration, argument refinement, structural analysis, reviewer simulation, and manuscript preparation.

Embedding Lifelong Learning In Hospitality Tvet: The Boma International Hospitality College(Kenya) Model For Sustainable Careers In Africa, Destaings Nyenyi Nyongesa, Samuel Irungu, Jocelyn Omusebe, Enoch Tunoi

ICHRIE Research Reports

The hospitality and tourism sector in Africa drives significant employment and growth, yet many workers enter the industry through informal pathways that limit career mobility. Embedding lifelong learning within Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) is therefore essential for reskilling, upskilling, and formally recognizing experiential learning. This study uses Boma International Hospitality College (BIHC) in Kenya as a case study to examine institutional models that support lifelong learning in hospitality TVET. A review of global, regional, and national literature was combined with an institutional analysis of BIHC’s training ecosystem, including international qualifications, micro-credentials, Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL), and …

Leveraging The Intersection Of Ai And Play To Foster Human Connectedness And Character Formation, Lori B. Doyle, Ashley Brandon

Journal of Organizational & Educational Leadership

The benefits of fostering character formation are vast, encompassing psychological, social and emotional growth, yet there is no universally prescribed manner by which to proceed. Central to these efforts is human connectedness, which enhances psychological functioning and provides a pivotal foundation for well-being. Emerging factors such as integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the pedagogy of play are novel topics for the conversation within the character formation discourse. These elements, while tangentially related, hold significant potential to amplify character formation and sense of belonging. This paper examines the intersection of AI, pedagogy of play, and character formation through a theoretical …

Critical Hope As A Discipline: Resisting Neoliberal Education And Teaching Toward Futurity, David H. Kahl Jr.

Feminist Pedagogy

The university was founded on the principles of critical thought and the critical examination of ideas. However, this vision has gradually eroded over time due to the permeation of neoliberal thought into the university’s walls. Since the last 1970s, hyper-capitalist ideologies have disrupted efforts to develop students into engaged citizens of the world who speak out against gendered, racial, sexual, economic and other forms of marginalization by propagating post-truth messages. Specifically, neoliberal entities produce messages that teach students that their role in life is not to build community and communal bonds among people. Rather, neoliberal entities produce post-truth messages that …

Seeking Kairos: Creating Oases Of Rest Through Contemplative Practice In The Elementary Classroom, Kaisu Aldom

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

Seeking Kairos: Creating Oases of Rest through Contemplative Practice in the Elementary Classroom

This article introduces rest and restfulness as contemplative practice in the context of elementary schooling. As a Canadian elementary teacher, I have been researching ways to introduce contemplative practices of education to support children in their well-being. Children struggle under the pressures of expectations to achieve and excel, to conform and perform, which just as well applies to their teachers. Schooling in a burnout society prioritizes achievement, productivity, and always doing something: “No time to waste” and “keep busy” are mandatory. Not incidentally, the etymological meaning of …

The Connect With Kindness Curriculum: Integrating Heart, Brain, And Whole-Child Development Through Holistic Education, Tatyana V. Tsyrlina-Spady, Amy N. Spangler, Katerina Bodovski

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

This paper presents Connect with Kindness, a holistic, trauma-informed, and child-centered curriculum designed to foster emotional literacy, empathy, and moral imagination through lived experiences of kindness. Grounded in the pedagogical legacies of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, Janusz Korczak, and Vasyl Sukhomlinsky—and enriched by contemporary insights from neuroscience and psychology—the curriculum reflects a contemplative and relational approach to education. Drawing on over 1,800 multimedia submissions from children in 45 countries, Connect with Kindness elevates children’s voices as co-creators of learning and encourages deep reflection through nature-based experiences, art, peer dialogue, and community engagement. By integrating Dr. Bruce Perry’s neurodevelopmental model and …

Artificial Intelligence (Ai) Additions To Nursing Education: Accommodating The Complexity Of Today’S Populations And Assuring Evidence-Based Pathways Of Patient-Centered Care, Jamie Anne Marcus, Bonnette Villalba Webb, Abigail Pauline Batin Villarroya

FDLA Journal

Predicted demographic changes in the rising older than 65 populations with possible declining mental and physical health mandate adaptations to new professional nursing roles that will incorporate technology, and changing policy environments. Nursing experience, knowledge, and skills will transition to new cognitive pathways to think and process information. Nurses will be supported by artificial intelligence (AI) technologies and become information integrators, health coaches, and continue to be deliverers of human caring. New transition pathways in nursing education to meet the needs of these diverse populations, and patient complex presentations will transcend to synergizing and optimize digital-age healthcare environments and assure …

Stoic Wisdom For The Contemplative Teacher: Prosochê And Praemeditatio Malorum As Alternative Approaches To Mindfulness, Anna Rumjahn

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

In K-12 environments where teacher burnout and attrition are increasingly prevalent, where can educational professionals seek sustainable approaches to reduce exhaustion, emotional demands, and uncertainty? In this paper, I extend Christopher McCaw’s research on the direct and dynamic relationship between contemplative practices and who teachers are and are becoming. By examining the current debates around defining reflective and contemplative practitioners, I call for alternative definitions of mindfulness when considering teacher professional becoming and submit for consideration the perspectives of Greco-Roman philosophy which has hitherto been less explored apropos education. Using prosochê (attention) and the Stoic exercise of praemeditatio malorum to …

Introduction: Facing The Challenge Of Ai With Feminist Pedagogy, Margaret A. Murray

Feminist Pedagogy

This special issue truly faces the challenge of AI with feminist pedagogy. The introduction briefly summarizes the five critical commentaries, five original teaching activities and three book reviews that make up this issue on AI.

9th Gsep Research Symposium - 2025

GSEP Research Symposium

The Ninth Annual GSEP Research Symposium, themed "Building Bridges to Elevate Humanity: Innovations and Insights in Education and Psychology", was hosted by the Pepperdine University Graduate School of Education and Psychology (GSEP) on June 19–20, 2025, at the historic Château d’Hauteville in Switzerland and virtually via Zoom.

This hybrid symposium convened a vibrant global community of students, alumni, faculty, and scholars to share research that addresses real-world challenges, advances scholarly inquiry, and builds pathways for inclusive collaboration and leadership. Spanning a wide array of topics—from artificial intelligence and mental health to trauma-informed practices, educational equity, social justice, and cross-cultural leadership—the …

Proceedings Of The Ursinus Colloquium On Liberal Education: Liberal Arts On Offense, Stephanie Mackler, Allison E. Carey, Matt Kozusko, Mark Schneider

Ursinus Colloquium on Liberal Education

About • Liberal Arts on Offense: Introductory Remarks • Questions Posed to the Alumni Panel • Panel Remarks from Session One: Offensive Liberal Arts • List of Participants

Ursinus Colloquium On Liberal Education: Liberal Arts On Offense, Ursinus College

Ursinus Colloquium on Liberal Education

This program for Ursinus College's third Colloquium on Liberal Education lists the speakers, panel discussions and activities of the two-day event. It includes alumni reflections on the value of a liberal education and provides introductory remarks about the relationship between liberal education and pre-professional education.

مدى تقبل مديري المدارس ومعلمي التعليم المهني (Betc) وأولياء الأمور للتعليم الدامج في المدارس الحكومية الأردنية في ظل التحول الرقمي, Ibrahim Ahmad Mlhem, Roa’A Bas’Sam Al-Khatib, Rawan Salameh Al-Iroud

Journal of the Association of Arab Universities for Research in Higher Education مجلة اتحاد الجامعات العربية للبحوث في التعليم العالي

هدفت الدراسة إلى الكشف عن مدى تقبل مديري المدارس ومعلمي التعليم المهني وأولياء الأمور للتعليم الدامج في المدارس الحكومية الأردنية في ظل التحول الرقمي. اعتمدت الدراسة المنهج الوصفي التحليلي، وتكوَّنت عينة الدراسة من (185) فرداً، تم اختيارهم بالطريقة العشوائية، وتم تطوير الاستبانة؛ إذ تكونت من (35) فقرة موزَّعة على (3) محاور، وهي الفوائد التي تعود على مديري ومعلمي مدارس التعليم المهني، وأولياء أمور الطلبة من ذوي الإعاقة، وتمَّ توزيع الاستبانة إلكترونياً على عينة الدراسة. أظهرت النتائج مدى تقبُّل مديري المدارس ومعلمي التعليم المهني وأولياء الأمور للتعليم الدامج في المدارس الحكومية الأردنية في ظل التحول الرقمي، فقد جاءت مرتفعة، ودلَّت على …

Gerard Manley Hopkins, Sj: Master Architect Of The Company Of Poets, Timothy J. Wesley

College of Education Theses and Dissertations

It has been 107 years since the first collected Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ were published by the poet-scholar’s friend and confidant Robert Seymour Bridges. Literary commentators, historians, and theologians have sought to understand the great poet of the Jesuits since the posthumous release of the poetry to the wide world in 1918. Of the many angles on Hopkins’s life that have been analyzed and examined, we could name a few: his sublimated sexuality, his identity as a religious priest, the poet’s placement within The Victorian Period, a voice of apologetic theology within Modernity, a political eco-centric voice, and …

Kelly's Whole Human Pedagogy: A Conversation With Eric Mortensen, Anna N. Kelly, Eric Mortensen

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

This interview with Eric Mortensen, Professor of Religious Studies at Guilford College, was conducted by Anna Kelly as a part of her study, Whole Human Pedagogy: A Novel Framework for Education Abroad Praxis (2024). In this interview, Kelly and Mortensen discuss holistic pedagogy, largely referencing Mortensen’s experience leading religious studies study abroad programs in Asia. They touch on the themes of embodiment, emotions, relationality, and the purpose of holistic teaching and learning in international education. This interview was conducted with IRB approval.

Leading And Learning From Inside Out: Insights From Meditative Inquiry, Jody L. Rebek

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

This article explores our modern world and our role in shaping collective experiences. By our thoughts, choices and behaviours (our character), we influence our shared reality. Higher education has an imperative responsibility to engage students ethically and develop their character. I offer a teaching metaphor and case study to meaningfully develop students’ self-awareness of character via an undergraduate leadership course. I employed the ‘seed’ metaphor to illustrate how nurturing students’ self-awareness and agency mirrors the growth of a seed within a carefully cultivated ecosystem. Each contemplative practice (character development) intertwined with leadership content (competence and confidence), serves as essential nourishment, …

Examining The Influence Of Hedonic Motivation And Willingness To Use Ai On Teacher’S Perceived Importance Of Instructional Practices And Student Engagement, Jacob Sands

The Scholarship Without Borders Journal

The study investigates the relationship between teachers' hedonic motivation to use artificial intelligence (AI), their willingness to accept AI devices, and their perceptions of the importance of instructional practices and student needs. Using a quantitative, predictive, and non-experimental research design, the study aims to determine to what extent hedonic motivation and willingness to adopt AI devices predict teachers’ perceived importance of instructional practices and students. Data will be collected from teachers in Los Angeles County using subscales from the Artificial Intelligence Interaction Model (AIMM) to measure hedonic motivation and willingness to accept AI, and the Importance of Teaching Knowledge Scale …

Empowering Writers: Integrating Digital Prewriting Tools In The Research Writing Process, Heather A. Rundo

Language Arts Journal of Michigan

This practitioner article explores the integration of digital prewriting tools, specifically MindMeister and VoiceThread, in a high school sophomore honors English class during a research writing unit. The author, a classroom teacher, discusses the challenges students face in research writing and seeks to enhance their confidence and organization skills. Drawing insights from student and teacher perspectives on writing strengths and weaknesses, the article delves into the significance of prewriting as a fundamental component of the writing process.

Rhetorics Of Encounter: Toward A Biocentric Theory Of Discourse, Matthew D. Whitaker

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Encounters with more-than-human identities are transformative moments that stand to affect dispositional and bodily change in individuals. From close brushes with wild animals in National Parks to everyday interactions with local ecologies, encounters invite us to feel and think differently about the nature of our realities. In Rhetorics of Encounter: Toward a Biocentric Theory of Discourse, I draw from interdisciplinary perspectives to disrupt the idea of rhetoric as a representational medium, arguing that rhetoric occurs not just through textual exchanges of words and symbols, but through embodied moments of contact with other responsive beings. Invoking George Kennedy’s theory …

Teaching Philosophy, Growing Child’S Empathy : Derrida’S Trace Theory For Critical Thinking And Character Education, Fatimah Fraya, Fristian Hadinata

International Review of Humanities Studies

Child bullying cases increased significantly following the pandemic and took its toll on the need for emergency tackling and preventive action. This research focused on philosophy as a an approach to character building, using the synthesis method of literature views which also inspired from previous teachings known as Philosophy for Children (P4C), combined with hands-on experiment simulation. The aim is to discover a practical learning concept to enable philosophy to be introduced in children's classrooms at a certain age. Researchers found the intersection between philosophy and child character building beneficial in refining their empathy cognitively and creating better generations in …

Narrative Inquiry As Contemplative Methodology, Lauren A.H. Brown

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

This reflective essay describes how contemplative practices, including mindfulness, presence, deep listening, contemplative reading, free writing, visualization, bearing witness, and loving kindness, were engaged during my doctoral research study. As a novice researcher but experienced practitioner, contemplative practice guided my research and creative processes, allowing me to present a deeper understanding of the participants in my study while simultaneously bringing a heartfulness to my ethical decisions. While it is not uncommon for researchers to draw on their existing skills in mindfulness and other contemplative practices, I propose that contemplative practice is central to narrative inquiry research, making it both a …