News from the Graduate Program in Critical & Creative Thinking
University of Massachusetts Boston17 February 2020
Student Matters
Students expecting to finish the MA program with a May or August graduation must apply to graduate no later than March 13th. Note that the steps to apply have changed for the 2020 year. Those who have a Graduate Certificate on their program plan and have completed the required coursework may also apply for the Certificate now even if still continuing toward the MA. Commencement is on Thursday, May 28th.
CCT Community
The admissions to the CCT graduate program are now open for fall 2020 admission (after a brief period of being on hold). The next application deadline will be June 1, 2020 for fall admission. Please also note that applications are being accepted for the MA and Graduate Certificate in Critical and Creative Thinking, but the option for the Science in a Changing World Track will not reopen at this time.
CCT Events
CCT Community Open House (online): Developing Inclusive Spaces for Creativity and Engaged Participation
Free and open to all.
Graduate Program in Critical and Creative Thinking, UMass Boston
Monday, February 24, 7:00-8:30pm ET
Participate online using direct link to Zoom web conference: https://umassboston.zoom.us/j/783326698
Please see the full details and description.
In this next event in our spring series of Dialogues on Reflective Practice, we explore the relationship between creativity, and inclusion of diverse participants in our spaces of learning, work, and community life. Rather than start from a prescribed presentation, the dialogue process uses a structured discussion format to draw together the experiences of the participants in opening up the questions that helps us to explore the topic. As reflective practitioners, we further try to understand the meaning of experiences as we look toward making change, in our individual practices or as collaborators within our communities. Anyone interested in the topic is welcome to attend. Additional inquiries and RSVPs (optional) may be directed to cct@umb.edu.
Look for future newsletters for announcements of upcoming events.
Alum and CCT associates Notes
CCT graduates are invited to complete our brief Alum Survey in support of forming vision for the upcoming years of the CCT program.
Congratulations to Olen Gunnlaugson (CCT faculty, Dialogue Processes), who recently released his new book (Trifoss Business Press, Vancouver):
Dynamic Presencing: A Transformative Journey into Presencing Mastery, Leadership and Flow
Description (Amazon.com): In his ground-breaking book, professor-practitioner Olen Gunnlaugson introduces five new journeys into developing a more embodied, effective and lived-into experience of presencing. Building from Theory U and other change processes, Dynamic Presencing offers an in-depth apprenticeship into transforming your current presencing practice. By helping presencing take root in our work and lives in a foundational way, Dynamic Presencing serves presencing practitioners from all fields—coaches, leaders, facilitators, change makers, educators, therapists, artists and social innovators—by opening up new inner pathways into an overall transformed presencing awareness in action.
CCT alums and associates are encouraged to send items of interest to
the Critical and Creative Thinking community to be included in future
newsletters. Please submit events, announcements, and opportunities
through this form: http://bit.ly/CCTSICWi
Events
Spring 2020 Capra Course
Online course, begins February 26, 2020, with pre-recorded lectures and extensive participation in online forums.
During the last three decades, a new conception of life has emerged at the forefront of science. It is a unified view that integrates life’s biological, cognitive, social and ecological dimensions. At the very core of this new understanding of life we find a profound change of metaphors: from seeing the world as a machine to understanding it as a network. This course will give you the conceptual tools to understand the nature of our systemic problems and to recognize the systemic solutions that are being developed by individuals and organizations around the world. More...
To register and for more information, see the web site.
Call for Papers: Journal of Contemplative Inquiry
Deadline for 2020 publication: April 15th, 2020.
We seek to publish work that builds bridges between the emerging field of contemplative education, broadly defined, and related practices in the wider Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), student life, faculty development, leadership studies, and related areas. Particularly welcomed are submissions that align with the mission of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society to further compassion and social justice in all aspects of higher education and in our world more widely. We welcome submissions that introduce, explore, and evaluate contemplative practices from different cultural traditions that deepen and support interactions across cultural boundaries and identities. This includes work that may draw on paradigms for conducting research that are different from or in addition to conventional academic methodologies.
See full details and submission guidelines.
The Philosophy Foundation is an organization dedicated to the development of philosophical inquiry in schools, communities, and workplaces. In addiition to sponsoring events and offering online blogs and resources, they offer a number of lesson plans and guides for teachers looking to integrate philosophical inquiry into their schools (free membership required). For more information, see the web site.
Food for Thought
Video:
How I help people understand vitiligo: Lee Thomas (YouTube)
How to do Nothing: Jenny Odell at Eyeo 2017 (Vimeo)
Articles:
How to Create a Project Based Learning Lesson (Cult of Pedagogy)
Defining and Denouncing Student Shaming: A Teacher’s Reflection (Faculty Focus)
U.S. Army Funds 'Fully Automated Microaggression Detector' to 'Catch Implicit Bias' in the Workplace (Blacklisted News)
5 Scientific Reasons People Still Believe In Astrology (Cracked)
U.S. News Says UMass Boston’s Online Graduate Education, Bachelor’s Programs Among Nation’s Best (UMass Boston)
In Search Of The Brain’s Social Road Maps (Scientific American)
Erich Fromm’s 6 Rules of Listening: The Great Humanistic Philosopher and Psychologist on the Art of Unselfish Understanding (Brain Pickings)
Joke theft: Is it really an issue in comedy? (Big Think)
Why the idea that the world is in terminal decline is so dangerous (Aeon)
Reusable plastic shopping bags are actually making the problem worse, not better (Quartz)
Civility Is Overrated: The gravest danger to American democracy isn’t an excess of vitriol—it’s the false promise of civility (The Atlantic)
Imagination is ancient (Aeon)
Physicists Claim They've Found Even More Evidence of a New Force of Nature (Science Alert)
The world is stuck with decades of new plastic it can’t recycle (Quartz)
Killing Creative Mortification: 3 ways improvisation can teach us to foster creativity (Psychology Today)
Student in Peru makes history by writing thesis in the Incas’ language (The Guardian)
Humor
The Art of Appreciating Art (New Yorker)