Evergreen State College, The
IN-25: Innovation B

For the past several years, Evergreen’s Curriculum for the Bioregion initiative has led a regional, inter-institutional faculty learning community, "Sustainability and Contemplative Practice." Curriculum for the Bioregion is an entirely grant-funded project within one of Evergreen’s public service centers, the Washington Center for Improving Undergraduate Education. This faculty learning community has met at the Whidbey Institute conference center to explore how reflective and contemplative practices might strengthen students’ ability to engage with the world’s complex sustainability challenges. As practitioners of different forms of contemplation in their personal lives, this community of faculty members seeks to develop reflective classroom practices to help students better discern and confront the realities and root causes of unsustainability, and further, explore how these practices can also plant seeds of deeper understanding, inspiration, purpose, and agency. Over 100 individuals from 25 colleges and universities in Washington State, Oregon, and Montana have shared their ideas and experiences in working meetings, retreats, and a listserv. This “Sustainability and Contemplative Practice” faculty learning community has disseminated its work at regional and national conferences including a pre-conference workshop at the AASHE conference in October 2017, the Washington Higher Education Sustainability Conference (2014), and at conferences of the Association for Contemplative Mind in Higher Education (three regional and national meetings in past three years). Many of the participants have contributed teaching approaches to the Curriculum for the Bioregion’s online curriculum collection, http://serc.carleton.edu/bioregion/index.html. And, the group has produced a book, Contemplative Approaches to Sustainability in Higher Education: Theory and Practice (Routledge, 2017). In the academic year 2016-2017, the group has took up the theme, “Teaching in an Age of Climate Consequences,” focusing particularly on the emotional and moral issues associated with teaching about climate change. Grants from the Kalliopeia Foundation and the Kaiser Family Foundation have partially supported the work of this faculty learning community. For additional information: Contact Jean MacGregor, Director, Curriculum for the Bioregion

https://www.routledge.com/Contemplative-Approaches-to-Sustainability-in-Higher-Education-Theory/Eaton-Hughes-MacGregor/p/book/9781138190184