Brooke Dodson-Lavelle is the Senior Education Consultant to Mind & Life's Ethics, Education, and Human Development Initiative and a co-developer of the Call to Care program for teachers and students. She is also completing her PhD in the Graduate Division of Religion at Emory University. Her academic work focuses on the confluence of Buddhist contemplative theory and cognitive science, as well as the cultural contexts that shape the transmission, reception, and secularization of Buddhist contemplative practices in America. She was a lead instructor for several studies examining the efficacy of Cognitively-Based Compassion Training (CBCT) at Emory, and has helped to develop and adapt compassion-based for school children as well as adolescents in the foster care system. Prior to attending Emory, she earned her bachelor of arts degree in religion and psychology at Barnard College, and her master's degree in religion at Columbia University. While at Columbia, she also worked as a research coordinator for the Columbia Integrative Medicine Program, where she developed and taught yoga and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) programs for a variety of clinical populations. Brooke serves on the Board of the Foundation for Active Compassion and works as a consultant at the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University. She now resides in the Bay Area where she develops and implements Innate Compassion Training (ICT) and Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT) inspired programs and trainings.
Peter M. Senge, Ph.D. is a Senior Lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is also Founding Chair of SoL, the Society for Organizational Learning, a global community of corporations, researchers, and consultants dedicated to the "interdependent development of people and their institutions."
Peter is the author of the widely acclaimed book, The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization (1990, revised edition published 2006) and, with colleagues Charlotte Roberts, Rick Ross, Bryan Smith and Art Kleiner, co-author of The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organization (1994) and a fieldbook The Dance of Change: The Challenges to Sustaining Momentum in Learning Organizations (March, 1999), also co-authored by George Roth. In September 2000, a fieldbook on education was published, the award winning Schools That Learn: A Fifth Discipline Fieldbook for Educators, Parents, and Everyone Who Cares About Education, co-authored with Nelda Cambron-McCabe, Timothy Lucas, Bryan Smith, Janis Dutton, and Art Kleiner.
Presence: Human Purpose and the Field of the Future, co-authored with Claus Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski and Betty Sue Flowers, and published in March 2004 by SoL, and in 2005 by Doubleday is available at www.presence.net.
Dr. Senge’s latest book The Necessary Revolution: How Individuals and Organizations are Working Together to Create a Sustainable World was published in 2008 and co-authored with Joe Laur, Nina Krushwitz, Sara Schley and Bryan Smith.Brimming with inspiring stories from individuals and organizations tackling social and environmental problems around the globe, The Necessary Revolution reveals how ordinary people at every level are transforming their businesses and communities.
Dr. Senge has lectured extensively throughout the world, translating the abstract ideas of systems theory into tools for better understanding of economic and organizational change. His areas of special interest focus on decentralizing the role of leadership in organizations so as to enhance the capacity of all people to work productively toward common goals. Dr. Senge's work articulates a cornerstone position of human values in the workplace; namely, that vision, purpose, reflectiveness, and systems thinking are essential if organizations are to realize their potentials. He has worked with leaders in business, education, health care and government.
The Fifth Discipline hit a nerve deep within the business and education community by introducing the theory of learning organizations. Since its publication, more than a million copies have been sold world-wide. In 1997, Harvard Business Review identified it as one of the seminal management books of the past 75 years. There have been feature articles in Business Week, Fortune, Fast Company, Sloan Management Review and other leading business periodicals regarding the work of Dr. Senge and his colleagues at MIT and SoL.
The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook (over 400,000 copies sold) was developed in response to questions from readers of The Fifth Discipline who wanted more help with tools, methods and practical experiences in developing enhanced learning capabilities within their own companies. The Dance of Change is based on more recent experiences of companies developing learning capabilities over many years, and the strategies leaders develop to deal with the many challenges this work entails. Dr. Senge has also authored many articles published in both academic journals and the business press on systems thinking in management.
The Journal of Business Strategy (September/October 1999) named Dr. Senge as one of the 24 people who had the greatest influence on business strategy over the last 100 years. The Financial Times (2000) named him as one of the world's “top management gurus.” Business Week (October 2001) rated Peter as one of The Top (ten) Management Gurus.
Peter Senge received a B.S. in engineering from Stanford University, an M.S. in social systems modeling and Ph.D. in management from MIT. He lives with his wife and their two children in central Massachusetts.
Katherine Weare is Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Southampton and has worked in Universities for most of her life, specialising in children’s mental health and wellbeing and in social and emotional learning. She has written some of the leading books and papers in this area and conducted several definitive reviews of the evidence that has informed policy and practice in many countries. She has been central to the development and implementation of national and international programmes for wellbeing, including ‘Schools for Health in Europe’ and the ‘Mental Health and Wellbeing in Schools Programme’ for the World Health Organisation. She is a key player in the development of the national primary and secondary SEAL (social and emotional aspects of learning) programmes for the English Department of Education, and editor, board member and advisor to several national and international journals and bodies devoted to mental health and wellbeing in children.
Steen Hildebrandt, Ph.D., is Professor of Organization and Management Theory at Aarhus Univeristy and Adjunct Professor of Leadership at Copenhagen Business School. His work focuses on leadership, resilience and sustainability. He has published numerous articles in Danish and international journals, as well as books and contributions to anthologies on these subjects. He is chairman of the board of Hildebrandt & Brandi A/S. He is a member of the board of directors of several companies and civil society organizations, including Børns Livskundskab, the Danish Society for the Promotion of Life Wisdom in Children.
Helle Jensen. Psychologist and family therapist. Helle Jensen has been working together with Jesper Juul teaching relational competence for professionals and counselling and therapy with families in different European Countries. She has been teaching professionals working with children and young people how to practice empathy and presence, and how to bring these values into the lives of children and young people. The author and coauthor of several books, for instance “Empati: Det der holder verden sammen” (Empathy, it´s what holds the world together) together with Jes Bertelsen, Jesper Juul, Steen Hildebrandt, Peter Høeg og Michael Stubberup (Rosinante, 2012), and “Nærvær og empati i skolen” (Akademisk forlag 2014).
Kevin Hawkins has worked with adolescents in various contexts for over 30 years - as teacher, school head, and social worker in the UK, Africa, and Europe. Until recently, and for the past 10 years, he was Middle School Principal at the International School of Prague in the Czech Republic. Kevin has taught mindfulness to teenagers, teachers and parents since 2010 and he currently manages Partnership Development for Mindfulness in Schools Project and is one of their lead teacher trainers. Kevin also works independently as a consultant and trainer in Social Emotional Learning and Mindfulness.
Luc Stevens is an emeritus professor of (special) education, Utrecht University (NL), currently professor of education Netherlands Open University and director and founding father of NIVOZ - the Netherlands Institute of Educational Matters, a think tank on education. Stevens has been trained as a clinical child and educational psychologist and as a pedagogue (in the European tradition).
Francisco Varela has been a strong influence and Luc’s later research has mainly focused on teacher-pupil interaction, considering the pupil as an actor, as a full partner of the teacher, considering both as trying to make sense out of teaching and learning. Currently the main topics of research and training are Pedagogical Tact (the Tact of Teaching) and Pedagogical Leadership, viewing people primarily as giving meaning to their existence.This program has developed and is still developing in the learning community of NIVOZ.
Luc Stevens has published extensively in the national and international arenas and is an advisor to the government. (NIVOZ), conducted a research project regarding the mismatch between supply and demand in 5 primary and 9 secondary schools in the Netherlands. His closing words in the report: ‘there is not one reason to keep this current school system as it is today’.
Mette Vedsgaard Christensen, PhD and Assoc Prof. VIA. Mette has taught literacy to teacher students since 2006. Mette is currently heading the VIA research project in relational competences in school and teacher education
Else Bengaard Skibsted, (MSc Psychology) Assoc Prof and ph.d.-fellow, VIA and Aarhus University. With a background in psychology, Else has taught in teacher education since 1998, and has published and edited several books on teaching and learning. Currently, Else is working in a ph.d.-project about life skills in school.
