Departmental Vision

Naropa University is the preeminent pioneer of contemplative education, which has been practiced here and at affiliated pre-K–12 schools since 1974. The Department of Contemplative Education, since its inception in 1990, has been dedicated to developing a nonsectarian, yet distinctly Shambhala Buddhist approach to education. This is an approach to education that enhances and is applicable to diverse ways of teaching and learning. 

The contemplative view of education begins with the transformation of the teacher. The inner journey of the teacher facilitates synchronization of mind and heart; discipline and delight; and fosters gentle authenticity. A further phase of the contemplative journey involves compassionate teaching and learning relationships.

Teachers, having discovered their own genuine style, model direct and caring interactions with their students and others. Management of learning environments arises from the teacher’s nonaggressive confidence, clarity and skillfulness, which is cultivated throughout the learning community. A further extension of this educational journey is the integration of contemplative perspectives into course content, and the transformation of physical learning environments into places that are both ordinary and sacred.

The department’s academic approach is an integrated emotional, intellectual, experiential and spiritual process. The inclusion of emotional energies into learning relationships and subject content vitalizes learning and makes it personally meaningful. Selected Eastern and Western holistic/spiritual approaches and pedagogies, such as those of Krishnamurti, Montessori, Kessler, Palmer and others, are studied to broaden students’ range of understanding for developing authentic teaching and learning methodologies.

Through Naropa’s lab school, departmental study abroad, and in public and private classrooms, departmental students are given direct experience in awareness-based education, compassionate inclusive communities and applied contemplative methodologies. Through the use of mindfulness meditation, loving kindness and awareness practices, students develop precision, depth, insight, openness and mind/body synchronization. All this has led our graduates to deep, joyful, sustainable and beneficial careers.