Dr. Dean Ornish is the author of is the author of seven books, all national bestsellers. UnDo It! (co-authored with Anne Ornish) was published by Random House as their lead nonfiction title in January 2019. His three main-stage TED.com talks have been viewed by almost six million people.

The research that he and his colleagues conducted has been published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, The Lancet, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Circulation, The New England Journal of Medicine, the American Journal of Cardiology, The Lancet Oncology, and elsewhere. A one-hour documentary of their work was broadcast on NOVA, the PBS science series, and was featured on Bill Moyers' PBS series, Healing & The Mind. Their work has been featured in all major media, including cover stories in Newsweek, TIME, and U.S. News & World Report. He has written a monthly column for TIME, Newsweek and Reader’s Digest magazines, is a LinkedIn Influencer, and was Medical Editor of The Huffington Post 2010-2016.

He was appointed by President Clintonto the White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy and by President Obama to the White House Advisory Group on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health. He is also a member of The Lancet Oncology “Moonshot Commission.” He has been a member of the boards of directors of the San Francisco Food Bank and the J. Craig Venter Institute. Dr. Ornish and colleagues established a lifestyle medicine clinic at the St. Vincent de Paul Homeless Shelter in San Francisco where over 30,000 homeless people were treated.

The “Ornish diet” has been rated “#1 for Heart Health” by a panel of experts at U.S. News & World Report

for eight years from 2011-2019. He co-chaired the Google Health Advisory Council with Marissa Mayer 2007-9.

This is a special edition of the Teachers Aligned Podcast featuring four amazing educators in South Carolina. Pete Stone is the Chester County Teacher of the Year. Chanda Jefferson is the 2020 SC Teacher of the Year from Fairfield. Jed Dearybury was a 2014 Honor Roll Teacher in SC and a national leader in professional development. Saani Niri is an SCforED Board Member and teacher from Rock Hill. 

In this episode, we talk about the reflections we've had since the pandemic started. We focus on the inequities that this pandemic has made even more obvious. We also talk about bringing an end to standardized testing. 

The conversation starts a few seconds in because I forgot to hit record.

Mag Dimond is the award-winning author of BOWING TO ELEPHANTS, Tales of a Travel Junkie (which hit #1 in 5 countries on the day it launched and just won Best Indie Biographies & Memoirs from Kirkus). Her book has been compared to EAT, PRAY, LOVE in professional reviews and has received accolades from many thought leaders in the mindfulness space, including Jack Kornfield. It’s full of stories of her travels around the world, self-discovery, healing, food, and so much more at magdimond.com.

She has been a world traveler since age 11 — living with her mother in Italy for 3 years — and has traveled the globe. Once a 10 year hospice volunteer, she is a practicing Buddhist and dedicated member of Spirit Rock Meditation Center north of San Francisco. Mag’s essays are on Elephant Journal (being read by almost 2 million people).

Meena Srinivasan, MA, National Board Certified Teacher, is a South Asian-American edupreneur with deep expertise in the fields of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and Mindfulness in Education. She is the Founding Executive Director of Transformative Educational Leadership (TEL), an empowering, racially and culturally diverse, compassion-centered, innovative program for educational leaders who are called to integrate mindfulness-based, social, emotional, academic and ethical learning into schools and school systems. Prior to this role she spent five and a half years working in partnership with the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) to implement SEL system-wide in the Oakland Unified School District. Meena has taught and led in a variety of school settings (public, private, urban, international) and holds a Clear Administrative Services Credential in the state of California. She is the creator of the SEL Every Day online courses, author of Teach, Breathe, Learn: Mindfulness In and Out of the Classroom and SEL Every Day: Integrating SEL with Instruction in Secondary Classrooms which was chosen as one of 2019’s Favorite Books for Educators by the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley. Meena’s article, “Social and Emotional Learning Starts with Adults” was one of ASCD’s 10 Best Express Articles of 2018.

Meena's Resources 

This is a short audio skit exploring a scenario where doctors were suddenly treated the way teachers are treated. 

Dr. Rick Hanson is a psychologist, Senior Fellow of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, and New York Times best-selling author. His books have been published in 29 languages and include  Resilient, Hardwiring Happiness, Buddha’s Brain, Just One Thing, and Mother Nurture – with 900,000 copies in English alone. His newest book is Neurodharma: Science, Wisdom, and Steps to the Highest Happiness will be released May 5, 2020.

Founder of the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom, he’s lectured at NASA, Google, Oxford, and Harvard, and taught in meditation centers worldwide. His work has been featured on the BBC, CBS, and NPR, and 150,000 subscribers receive his free Just One Thing newsletter every week. He has a variety of popular online programs in positive neuroplasticity – with scholarships available for those with financial need.

Dr. Hanson has been a trustee of Saybrook University, served on the board of Spirit Rock Meditation Center, and was president of the board of FamilyWorks, a community agency. He began meditating in 1974, trained in several traditions, and leads a weekly meditation gathering. He and his wife live in northern California and have two adult children. He enjoys being in wilderness and taking a break from emails. Please welcome Dr. Rick Hanson.

Social Media

https://www.twitter.com/drrhanson/

https://www.instagram.com/rickhansonphd/

https://www.youtube.com/user/drrhanson

Website

https://rickhanson.net/

Being Well Podcast

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/being-well-podcast-with-dr-rick-hanson/id1120885936?mt=2

TRIGGER WARNING - This podcast contains information about suicide which may be upsetting to some people.

Susan Crooks is an educator with over 25 years of teaching experience. She holds a M.Ed. from Clemson University and is a certified trainer and ambassador for The Foundation for Critical Thinking. Ms. Crooks and her son, Walt, worked at the same school for almost 10 years. They have presented their unique theory on the pairing of mindfulness and critical thinking at conferences across the United States. The loss of Walt due to anxiety and depression led Susan to establish Walt’s Waltz.

A driven mother and educator, Susan strives to open conversations and change prevailing perspectives on Mental Health.

Susan's Recommendations

Shelly Fox is the Director of Blue Mountain School, a contemplative progressive school in Floyd, Virginia. Her background is in community-based and school-based counseling.  Blue Mountain School’s model of Contemplative Progressive education is also grounded in values and practices that facilitate change and growth, and the model asks that everyone in their school community—parents, students, and teachers—support each other as they learn and grow from their experiences. 

Shelly states, "I am happy to be focusing my attention and energy to co-create (on a foundation that already has been established by those who came before) a small-scale educational system that fosters the development of loving human relationships, self-awareness, and self-efficacy—all of which are things that kids (and all of us!) need to be at peace in the world."

Shelly's Recommendations

Blue Mountain School

Katy Swift is a certified guidance counselor who spent the last three years working at a low Socioeconomic status, high trauma primary school in Texas. Prior to her time as a counselor, she was a dyslexia interventionist in an elementary school as well as an intervention consultant to several private schools. She received training to practice classroom yoga from Yoga In My School in 2018. Among the many different counseling interventions implemented, yoga was one of the favorites of both staff and students. Recently relocated to Friendswood with her family, she volunteers teaching yoga to pre-k students at the Melinda Webb School, a school for Oral Deaf Education that uses specialized instruction to accelerate students’ development of spoken language. Her spare time is spent with her husband, her dogs and her 10 year old son who will ONLY do yoga with her if it’s Star Wars themed!

Katy's Recommendations:

Books

Yoga for Children - Lisa Flynn

Websites

kidsyogastories.com

Taylor Walsh established the Project for Whole Health Learning in K-12 in 2017 as a result of his work as a consultant in integrative medicine and health. Attracted to the patient- and consumer-driven demand for therapies like mind-body medicine and acupuncture, he helped client organizations elevate awareness of the evidence and outcomes for policy makers, patient organizations, healthcare providers and the public.

This work included creating and managing the grass-roots advocacy program CoverMyCare for the Integrative Health Policy Consortium (IHPC), which engaged state-based advocates around provisions of the Affordable Care Act intended to end insurer discrimination against licensed healthcare providers.

He has written for the field’s publication of record, The Integrator Blog, written and edited symposium reports and policy guidebooks and is co-author of the e-book, “The Rise of Integrative Heath & Medicine, The Milestones: 1963 – Present,” which chronicles the notable milestones in the evolution of integrative medicine.

The work in integrative health and wellness builds on Taylor’s experience with new and disruptive enterprises: in daily journalism, personal computing, online information services (pre-web: he was managing editor at The Source, the first national online services built for personal computer owners), the Internet and Web, in local digital information services, and since 2009 in developing the concept of what is now WholeHealthED.

Taylor's E-mail: [email protected]

Taylor's Recommendations

Children & Nature Network