The Greater Good Science Center Summer Institute for Educators 2019

Accommodations and Meals

We understand that many local participants might prefer to sleep at home during the Institute. However, those from nearby communities during past Institutes stated repeatedly how grateful they were for the opportunity to leave behind the daily stressors of life. Time away from home allowed them to fully engage in the learning community and to reflect more deeply upon the material. Therefore, we are requesting that all participants stay on campus.

Housing accommodations are located at the University of California, Berkeley, Clark Kerr Campus--a beautiful Spanish-style complex, highlighted by terra cotta accents, tiled fountains, and landscaped courtyards. Situated in a lovely Berkeley neighborhood, the campus is within walking distance of restaurants, shops, and the UC Berkeley main campus. For outdoor enthusiasts, there are several hiking trails with breathtaking views of the San Francisco Bay directly behind the campus.

The two- and three-bedroom suites have living rooms and one or two bathrooms that are shared by suite occupants. Each participant will be assigned a private room with a shared bath.

Participants will dine in the Great Hall Dining Room with its richly paneled walls and coffered ceiling. Buffet menus offer a wide selection of hot entrees (including vegetarian and vegan options), a 100% organic salad bar, vegetables, soup, beverages, and desserts at each meal. Breakfast and lunch are included, beginning with breakfast on Monday and ending with lunch on Friday. Coffee, tea, and snacks will be available during the meeting sessions. You will arrange your own evening meals in Berkeley (or the greater Bay Area).

Transportation

Participants are required to arrange their own travel arrangements. Please do not make any arrangements until you are admitted to the program. More details will be included in the registration package.

Parking:
Weekly parking permits are available for $100

Nearby airports:
Oakland International Airport
San Francisco International Airport

Transportation from the airport:
BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) + taxi
Bayporter (daytime, by reservation only)
Super Shuttle (evening, by reservation only)
Taxi or Uber/Lyft

What Is Included

• 6 days of training
• Accommodations, including breakfast and lunch, for 5 nights, 6 days
• Web-based and printed materials
• 1-year membership to the Greater Good Science Center
• A certificate of completion

Who Should Apply

School professionals who are interested in cultivating the prosocial development and well-being of students and the adults who work with them, including:

• Pre-K through 12 classroom teachers, paraeducators, and out-of-school-time providers
• Pre-K-12 School mental health professionals and counselors
• Pre-K-12 School and district-level administrators
• Pre-K-12 Teacher and administrator educators
• Other higher education lecturers or professors are welcome to apply, but please be aware that the Institute is geared primarily towards Pre-K-12 educators

Fees

The cost per participant is $2,600. This includes tuition, materials, room, and board (breakfast and lunch included). Participants are responsible for their own travel expenses and arrangements.

Groups of three or more from the same school and/or district will receive a 10% discount per person.

Scholarships

While we are still accepting applications for the 2019 Summer Institute for Educators, we regret that we are unable to offer any additional scholarship funding. 

Understanding that those who attend the Summer Institute for Educators do so on the salary of education or non-profit professionals, we do our best to make the Institute affordable without sacrificing quality or integrity. If you are unable to pay the full amount, we ask that you first check with your school/organization to see if they will cover any of your costs with professional development or other funding. If your school does not have funding, or their funding does not cover what you need, we may be able to provide a partial scholarship to help offset the cost of attendance.

The Greater Good Science Center is completely funded by donations and grants -- we do not receive any financial support from the University of California, Berkeley. As such, we have limited funds available for scholarships and cannot offer full scholarships. In order to be as fair as possible to all applicants and create the most opportunity we can with the scholarships, we ask applicants to request the minimum necessary.   

Please note that UC Berkeley policy prohibits us from awarding scholarships for travel.

Cancellation Policy

Cancellations must be submitted via fax or email. Full refunds will be given up to 45 days prior to the start of the program. Due to program demand and pre-institute preparations, cancellations received 44-31 days prior to the start of the program are subject to a fee of 10% of the program tuition. Cancellations received within 30 days prior to the start of the program and no-shows are subject to the full program tuition. Please note: cancellation fees are based upon the date the written request is received.

Nondiscrimination Policy

The University of California, in accordance with applicable Federal and State Law, does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex (including sexual harassment), gender identity, pregnancy/childbirth and medical conditions related thereto, disability, age, medical condition (cancer-related), ancestry, marital status, citizenship, sexual orientation, or status as a Vietnam-era veteran or special disabled veteran.

How to Apply

To apply, please click on the “Application” tab and complete the online form.

Applicants will be notified whether or not they are accepted into the Institute within two weeks of applying; payment will be due in full upon your acceptance to the institute. 

Groups of three or more from the same school and/or district will receive a 10% discount per person.

• 

  Vicki Zakrzewski, Ph.D.

  As the Education Director at the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, Vicki Zakrezewski (zahk-shef-skee) translates the science of empathy, compassion, altruism, gratitude, happiness, mindfulness, forgiveness, awe, and other prosocial qualities into practical ways PreK-16 education professionals can use this science in their work with students, to build positive school cultures, and for their own well-being.

  She has written numerous articles that have appeared in Greater Good, Edutopia, Educational Leadership, and Huffington Post, given talks and workshops all over the world, and designed and facilitated the annual GGSC Summer Institute for Educators.
  
  Vicki also consults and collaborates with educational organizations, including CASEL's California Collaborating States Initiative; Science for Monks and Nuns in Dharamsala, India; the Knowledge and Human Development Authority in Dubai, UAE; the Millennium School in San Francisco; the Mind and Life Institute (of which she is a fellow); the Jim Henson Company on a new television show for preschoolers; the International School of Brussels on the Common Ground Collaborative curriculum; the Center for Healthy Minds; New Teacher Center; several social-emotional learning programs, including Second Step, Open Circle, Mind Up, and Inner Resilience; and Pixar/Disney on The Emotions Survival Guide – a follow-up book for children based on the movie Inside Out. She is currently creating a new online resource for educators that will launch in August 2019.

  A former teacher and school administrator, Vicki earned her Ph.D. in Education and Positive Psychology from Claremont Graduate University. In her doctoral research, Vicki spent two months in India at a school awarded the Peace Education Prize by UNESCO and the Hope of Humanity Award by the Dalai Lama, researching their methods for developing teachers’ ability to create caring relationships with students.

• 

  Amy L. Eva, Ph.D.

  Amy L. Eva, Ph.D., is the associate education director at the Greater Good Science Center. She writes for the GGSC’s online magazine, teaches at the Summer Institute for Educators, and consults on the development of a new GGSC toolkit for educators. With over 23 years in classrooms, she is a teacher at heart. She is fascinated by neuroscience, the psychology of learning, and adolescent development and has spent the last 12 years as a teacher educator.

  As a researcher, she has published in the areas of teacher education, metacognition, adolescent mental health, social emotional learning, and mindfulness-based interventions with marginalized youth. Her most recent publication “The Mindful Teacher: Translating Research into Daily Well-being” (The Clearing House), describes mindfulness, provides research-based evidence of its usefulness, and highlights resources that educators can use to manage stress and improve their well-being.

  Amy received her doctorate in educational psychology from the University of Washington where she studied the interplay between thoughts and feelings as readers respond to poetry. In the creative realm, she has led a poetry reading group called “Monday Morning Musings” and has contributed to a book featuring poems that inspire educators: Teaching with Fire: Poetry That Sustains the Courage to Teach. Amy lives with her husband Tim, three kids, and three cats in Seattle. She conducts workshops on teacher resilience and provides resources for educators on her blog (www.amyleva.com).

• 

  Emily Campbell is the research associate for the education program at the Greater Good Science Center, as well as a Ph.D. candidate in Human Development and Education at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Education, from which she received her MA. 

  At the GGSC, she contributes to education content, helps run the Summer Institute for Educators, makes presentations to educators and parents about prosocial development, and coordinates projects such as educator surveys and the gratitude in education grant program. In her academic work, her research interests include moral development and education; social-emotional learning and prosocial development; and parenting/family socialization across cultures. Along with projects on the measurement of social-emotional learning outcomes and on parenting in Japan, she is currently working on her dissertation, which investigates high schoolers' moral reasoning in relation to their social-emotional competencies and classroom contexts.

  Before coming to Berkeley and the GGSC, she graduated from Stanford with a degree in Human Biology (with a concentration on psychosocial development), worked at an elementary school in East San Jose through the City Year program, and spent two years teaching English at a high school in Japan. She loves traveling, but is always grateful for the beautiful environment, weather, diversity, and vegetarian food availability in the Bay Area.

• 

  Shawn Ginwright, Ph.D.

  Dr. Shawn Ginwright, a leading national expert on African American youth activism and development. He is an Associate Professor of Education in the Africana Studies Department at San Francisco State University and the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Flourish Agenda, a social impact and research company that provides information, and strategies that improve outcomes for youth of color. He is the author of Hope and Healing in Urban Education and Black Youth Rising, Activism and Radical Healing in Urban America among numerous others publications.

• 

  Frederic Luskin, Ph.D.

  Frederic Luskin, Ph.D., founded and currently serves as Director of the Stanford University Forgiveness Projects. He is also Senior Consultant in Health Promotion at the Stanford University Health Center and Department Chair in Clinical Psychology at Sofia University. At Stanford Dr. Luskin teaches classes on The Art of Happiness, Meditation, Developing Emotional Intelligence and The Psychology of Storytelling to undergraduate and graduate students. He also conducts numerous workshops and staff development trainings in his work for the Stanford Be Well wellness program.

  Dr. Luskin is the author of the best-selling books Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness and Forgive for Love: The Missing Ingredient for a Healthy and Happy Relationship. His book Forgive for Good is the best-selling self-help book published on the topic of forgiveness. His research has shown that the Forgive for Good forgiveness methodology leads participants suffering from a wide range of concerns to improved physical and mental health.

  Dr. Luskin’s forgiveness work has been applied in veteran’s hospitals, churches, in resolving legal disputes, with cancer patients as psycho education and in psychotherapy. He has helped people recover from the murder of their family members as a result of political violence in Northern Ireland, as an aftermath of the attacks on 911, in Sierra Leone after their civil war and in artic Canada where native populations deal with the loss of their ancestral lands.

  Dr. Luskin’s work has been made into a PBS pledge drive video called Forgive for Good. He has been interviewed many hundreds of times in world -wide media on forgiveness including the New York Times, O Magazine, Today Show, Los Angeles Times, Time Magazine, Huffington Post, and CBS Morning News.

  He is also the author of Stress Free for Good: Ten Scientifically Proven Life Skills for Health and Happiness which emerged from his 10 years as a researcher in preventive cardiology at the Stanford University School of Medicine. His work showed the effect of enhancing stress management and positive emotion skills to in help patients cope with congestive heart failure and arrhythmia. He also did some consulting work for Stanford Hospital nurses in managing their emotions.

  Dr. Luskin teaches stress management, emotional intelligence and happiness skills to corporate clients throughout the United States. His work focuses on the research proven triad of a healthy and happy life: Enhancing interpersonal relationships, creating a positive purpose in life and guided practice in appreciation and other positive emotions.

• 

  Eve Ekman, Ph.D., MSW

  Eve Ekman, Ph.D., MSW, is the GGSC’s director of training. An experienced speaker, researcher, and group facilitator, she brings a unique background ideally suited to training individuals and organizations in the science of happiness, resilience, compassion, mindfulness, and emotional awareness.

  Eve creates dynamic trainings adapted specifically for the needs of her participants, drawing upon her deep scientific knowledge, direct clinical work, and experiences in a range of institutional and organizational settings, particularly within the health care field. She worked for years as a social worker in health care, criminal justice, and social welfare systems, which inspired her to earn her master’s and Ph.D. at UC Berkeley and complete her postdoctoral training at UCSF Osher Center for Integrative Medicine.

  Her research has focused on helping professional care providers prevent burnout by giving them easier access to practices of attention, insight, and resilience. Building on her research, she developed trainings to address burnout in national and international organizations and has delivered keynotes and workshops for a wide range of companies, including Airbnb, Salesforce, and Kaiser Permanente.

  Eve is a second-generation emotion researcher who has had meaningful collaborations with her father, renowned emotion researcher Dr. Paul Ekman, including on The Atlas of Emotions, an online visual tool commissioned by the Dalai Lama to teach emotional awareness, and Cultivating Emotional Balance, an intensive, evidence-based training for compassion and mindfulness. Eve’s writing on empathy, burnout, and compassion has appeared in peer-reviewed journals, magazines, and books, including Oxford handbooks of positive psychology and compassion science. She is a regular practitioner of meditation, yoga, and cold water surfing, and brings her enthusiasm for living a rich emotional life into her teaching.

I live in the Bay Area. Can I commute to the institute and sleep at home?

We understand that many local participants might prefer to sleep at home during the Institute. However, those from nearby communities who attended the Institute in the past stated repeatedly how grateful they were for the opportunity to leave behind the daily stressors of life. Time away from home allowed them to fully engage in the learning community and to reflect more deeply upon the material. Therefore, we are requesting that all participants stay on campus.

Do you offer CEUs for this course?

Unfortunately, we are unable to offer CEUs at this time.

Can my spouse/partner stay with me in the dorms?

Yes, for an extra fee. 

Can I arrive a day early or stay a day later?

We are unable to arrange for additional housing before or after the Institute, so you must provide your own accommodations if you wish to arrive early or stay late.

Will we have free time to explore Berkeley, Oakland and San Francisco?

Yes, besides the first evening of the Institute, you will have all evenings free to explore the Bay Area.

Here is what some past institute attendees have said about their experience:

"Attending the Institute both helped me to be deeply grateful for the things my school already does, and to imagine and envision the places we can go in promoting SEL, mindfulness, and character education. Working with students of backgrounds historically underrepresented in higher education, these areas are so essential and so often neglected or ignored. It will be so special to bring back to share with my team and students."

"The Institute absolutely lived up to the promises of its advertised objectives. GGSC is moving at the speed of current research, and reflecting it holistically and objectively. The facilitators are experts in their fields and synthesized and presented in a highly engaging and effective manner. The Institute helped me refine my professional philosophy and purpose; I am very grateful for the entire experience."

"I highly recommend the SIE the everyone and anyone involved in education, from infancy to adults. They encourage educators to walk the talk as human beings in order to guide others in doing it as well. What an engaging, awe-filled, emotional and inspirational way to spend the week!"

"The SIE was a perfect blend of research discussion and practical application of the science of prosocial development. I am confident that the information that I am taking back to my school community will have a positive impact on school climate, as well as enriching our social-emotional learning curriculum."

"I have "come of age" in education during this period of standards and assessment. While clear interventions and measures have value, it is also of value to nourish the journey of each of us - students and educators. GGSC SIE shines a light on the "moreness" of this work. How we can support students not only in learning context, but practicing the ways of being that will serve them every single day. It is affirming to be surrounded with others who see this as integral to learning and living. This is a powerful and uplifting family to which we all belong. This is the moreness."

For more information, please email ggsceducation@berkeley.edu or call 510-761-7865.

2014 SIE participants practice mindful movement that can be used with students in the classroom