April 5, 2002

COMMUNITY NEWSLETTER FOR
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF INTEGRAL STUDIES

CIIS Co-Sponsors Conference on
Spirituality & Learning

CIIS is co-sponsoring a conference on April 18-20 here in San Francisco, entitled Spirituality and Learning: Redefining Meaning, Value, and Inclusion in Higher Education. The conference is part of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) Network for Academic Renewal. AAC&U offers an annual series of state-of-the-art working conferences that provide practice-centered workshops on cutting-edge work in curriculum reform, teaching and learning, program assessment, and strategies for organizational change.

President Subbiondo, Conference Convener

President Joseph L. Subbiondo is the conference convener. In talking about organizing the conference, he said, "The fact that we were asked to co-sponsor this conference is a testament to the Institute's faculty and our increasingly visible leadership role. I'm delighted that faculty and staff from CIIS are collaborating with noted academics from a variety of institutions—including Alexander Astin, director of the Higher Education Research Institute and Professor of Education, UCLA; Ursula Goodenough, Professor of Biology, Washington University; Eugene Rice, Scholar in Residence and Director of Faculty Roles and Rewards, AAHE; and Arthur Zajonc, professor of Physics, Amherst College."

Spirituality as a source of meaning, value, and social responsibility is becoming a more prominent focus in both civic and professional life, and the national conversation is making its way to campuses. Sessions will explore the implications of spiritual quests at all levels: in conceptions of campus diversity and inclusion; in the lives of faculty, students, and administrators; in path-breaking new scholarship across the disciplines; in the classroom and co-curriculum; and especially in the relations between academic and students affairs. Conference sessions will also explore the obstacles to diversity and inclusion that emerge when an institution does not engage its students' most fundamental sources of identity and commitment.

CIIS, appropriately, will have a strong leadership presence at the conference, with Joseph Subbiondo (President); Richard Buggs (Dean of Students); Brian Swimme (Philosophy, Cosmology & Consciousness); Karen Trueheart (Spiritual Emergence Network); Charlene Spretnak (Philosophy, Cosmology & Consciousness); Joanne Gozawa (Transformative Learning & Change); Gwendolyn Dungy (Board of Trustees); and Riane Eisler (Council of Sages).

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Students in Action

Women's Spirituality Scholars at AAR

Several scholars (both alumnae and students) from the CIIS Women's Spirituality Program presented at the Western Regional American Association of Religion Conference, March 24-26 at St. Mary's College in Moraga. Their presentations were:

Susan Carter '00, Ph.D., Amaterasu-o-mi-kami, the Japanese Sun Goddess: Her Emergence and Survival and Impermanence in the Enduring Arts of Japan in the Religion and the Arts Session, which was chaired by Louise Pare, doctoral student.

Artist: Tricia Grame, Her Vessel

Tricia Grame '00, Ph.D., The Body, the Vessel: Why All the Mystery and Embarrassment.

Laura Kristine Chamberlain, student, Encounters with the Goddess Durga in Nepal: An Interdisciplinary Study of the Mother Goddess of Paradox.

Community Engagement

Opportunities for integrating spirituality with action continue to expand at CIIS. One example of this expansion is the course, "Spirit, Compassion, and Community Activism" offered in the School of Consciousness and Transformation this semester. Susan Carter '00, Ph.D., adjunct faculty member who developed and now teaches the course, says, "Everyone involved in community-based learning and activism benefits: the students, the Institute, and the larger community. Through their community engagement the students in the class are doing important work. Their contributions are inspiring."

Here are a few examples of the kinds of work students are doing this semester:

• Becki diGregorio (East-West Psychology) helps serve meals at the St. Anthony's Dining Room.

• Jeff Freedman (counseling psychology) works with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth through drama and action techniques workshops.

• Mary Ann Maggiore (Philosophy, Cosmology & Consciousness), a long-time peace activist, is helping peace groups work together and collaborate for more effective peace action efforts.

• Elizabeth Varin (Transformative Learning & Change) volunteers as a teacher's aid at a school for children who have been diagnosed as severely disturbed as the result of abuse.

• Gina Yoli, who is an auditing student from Israel, is volunteering at S.F. General Hospital's nursery providing rocking and holding for preemies in their neo-natal care unit. She will also be doing movement/body awareness classes for women in recovery at St. Elizabeth's.

Circle of Change

Patricia Rojas (Expressive Arts Therapy) and Darcy Riddell (Philosophy, Cosmology & Consciousness) recently attended a weeklong "Spirit in Action" training led by activist trainer George Lakey, with over 30 activists-facilitators from around the country who are launching the first round of a project called Circles of Change. The project's goal is to support the movement toward building a more just and sustainable future by bridging the gap between spirituality and social transformation. Participants came from diverse cultural, racial, and spiritual backgrounds, and are creating ten circles around the country. The team led by Patricia and Darcy is the only one led by an international (Colombian/ Canadian) team. For more information contact darcyr@ciis.edu.

Meetings for People of Color and
First Nations Announced

All people of color at the Institute are welcome to meetings that are being held on the first and third Wednesdays from 11:00am-12:00noon in Room 306, and on the second and fourth Tuesdays from 2:00-3:00pm in Room 434. These meetings offer a combination of support and problem-solving in dealing with issues around race and inequality in education and institutional settings.

For additional information, contact Monique LeSarre at 415.575.6235 or moniquel@ciis.edu.

Summer at CIIS Professor Ralph Metzner This year, CIIS is offering a series of lectures and workshops sure to spice up your summer, addressing topics such as yoga, shamanism, drama therapy, spirit and work, poetry, movement, and the Goddess. CEUs and academic credit available. Selected offerings: Coaching the Spirit, Maria Nemeth, 5/31-6/2 Advanced Yoga Philosophy, Jim Ryan, 6/1-2 Writing as Art, Cindy Shearer, 6/2 Transformative Leadership, Ken Otter, 6/6-8 The Healing Art of Poem Making, John Fox, 6/14-16 Yoga for the Eyes, Meir Schneider, 6/14 & 6/22 Psychodramatic Family Therapy, Judye Hess, 6/15-16 The Alchemy of Movement, Jaime Nisenbaum, 6/22-23 Yoga Asanas and the Emotions, Sophia Reinders, 6/28-30 Fearless Journey Toward the Final Exit with an Open Heart, Rina Sircar, 7/12-14 Shamanic Divination and Holotropic Breathwork, Ralph Metzner, 7/18-23 Fundamentals of Acupressure, Michael Gach, 7/26-28 Yoga for Body-Mind-Spirit Integration, Sophia Reinders, 7/26-28 Kundalini Yoga, Stuart Sovatsky, 8/10-11 Visit www.ciis.edu or call 415.575.6175 for complete details and to register.

Dialogue for Peace
South Asia: Crises and Possibilities
by Professor Angana Chatterji

Friday, April 26, 6:00-9:30pm
Namaste Hall, 3rd floor

CIIS's second Dialogue for Peace will address issues of war and peace in South Asia: nation building in Afghanistan, Hindu fundamentalism in India, and democracy in Pakistan.

Making democracy is contingent upon the risks citizens are willing to take in the shaping of a just society. Somewhere in the becoming of nation states, South Asia must rethink the very assimilative and hierarchical economic, cultural, military and political fabric on which nation state building is premised in the 20th/21st century. At a critical time in the history of South Asian nations, the Dialogue will speak to long term strategies toward democratizing South Asia and South Asians so we might honor the sacred promises we have made to each other in the name of justice and freedom for all citizens. Please send questions, suggestions, or thoughts to Professor Angana Chatterji at anganac@ciis.edu or call 415.575.6242.

Lori Fjerkenstad Hired as SEN Co-Director

by Karen Trueheart, Co-Director, Spiritual Emergence Network

Lori Fjerkenstad

I am pleased to announce that Lori Fjerkenstad, a graduate of the Integral Counseling Psychology Program and a clinical associate with the Spiritual Emergence Network (SEN), is now co-director. (This is not a new position, as she and I will share directorship.) She will assume primary responsibility for SEN's Information and Referral Service, as well as supervise the start-up of the Training and Research Center at the Minna Street Center.

Through our Information and Referral Service, staffed, in part, by students in the Spiritual Emergence Theory and Practice Class, we field between 60 and 90 calls per month. We offer counseling at Church Street through the Postgraduate Associateship Program. Through our National Referral Directory of licensed professionals, we offer service nationwide. To our knowledge, CIIS is the only school with access to a population of individuals for whom spiritual challenges are their "presenting issues." This gives CIIS students and faculty unique educational, training, and research opportunities.

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Psychology in the Wilderness
Clinical Psychology Doctoral Student Explores
Wilderness as Therapy

John Harrison and his nieces, Savannah (l) and Lane (r)

CIIS clinical psychology student and doctoral candidate John Harrison has developed a course on the Psychology of Wilderness, which he is teaching at Sonoma State University, informed by a wealth of mountaineering and backpacking experience, former residency at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, and 18 years of Zen Buddhist practice. In the course he explores wilderness and the spiritual quest, the psychology of ascent, wilderness and the unconscious, ecopsychology, and wilderness as therapy. His dissertation proposal addresses the "effects of challenging wilderness experience on self-esteem in adolescents." He says, "The process of teaching has revealed to me (again) how much there is to learn."

John stays active hiking and playing competitive tournament tennis. Last December he won the San Francisco community tennis league's top division in men's singles against an opponent 20 years younger! John practices what he teaches: though he recently turned fifty, he is looking for more "peak experiences" and is planning an expedition to Ecuador and Peru to climb the mountains Chimborazo and Huascaran, both with summits over 20,000 feet elevation.

 

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Save the Date! April 25, Thursday, 7:00-9:00pm, Room 306 The East-West Psychology Program invites you to a panel discussion on the recent ReVision issue, New Horizons in Contemporary Spirituality, with a focus on Sexuality, Gender, and Spirituality (edited by Professor Jorge N. Ferrer). Join several of the ReVision authors in this exciting exploration of the interface of sexuality, gender, and spirituality. It's free of charge—refreshments will be served. Panelists: Ramon V. Albareda, clinical psychologist, sexologist, theologian, and co-author of Nacidos de la Tierra: Sexualidad, Origen del Ser Humano; CIIS Professor Jorge N. Ferrer, author of Revisioning Transpersonal Theory; CIIS professor Kaisa Puhakka, co-editor of Transpersonal Knowing; CIIS adjunct faculty Marina T. Romero, co-author of Nacidos de la Tierra: Sexualidad, Origen del Ser Humano; Jenny Wade, interim president of The Graduate Institute, Milford, CT, and author of Changes of Mind.

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Registrar's Deadlines

April 15, 2002: Last date to submit completed forms and completed dissertation/thesis to the library for spring 2002 graduation.

April 17, 2002: Summer schedules will be mailed to all students.

May 1, 2002: If the library requires any additional format and/or UMI corrections, they must be completed and the dissertation/thesis returned to the library by this date.

Now Available: Financial Aid Applications for fall 2002 (including scholarship applications) are available in the Financial Aid Office, Room 402, fourth floor.