CREATING A WISER WORLD
ONE MIND AT A TIME
Planting Seeds of Mindfulness:
A Professional Development Program for Schools and Educational Spaces
Bring Mindfulness into your school with
The Interdependence Project!
Teach with Integrity
The Interdependence Project is a non-profit founded in 2007 which has been leading Meditation Teacher Trainings for eleven years. This work has informed our new offerings for schools and educational spaces. We will be able to work with a handful of schools during Fall of 2022. Our team of trained facilitators can work around your schedule to make our workshops available to you.
With many years of experience in the field, our facilitators have been teachers in private and public schools in addition to museums and community centers as well as instructional coaches who worked directly within schools. IDP is an organization dedicated to providing high-quality mindfulness curriculum and professional development in your school or educational space.
Our Goals
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Integrate mindfulness more seamlessly into the curriculum
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Offer teachers space to prevent burnout and promote well being
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Equip teachers with the language, rationale and the opportunity for using mindfulness techniques in a classroom
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Provide the tools required to pause and think before responding
"Thank you to The Interdependence Project for visiting our school and providing mindfulness teacher training. During this session, our teachers learned how to incorporate mindfulness into their classroom curriculum, their interaction with students, and in their everyday lives. Our instructor created a very safe space for us to share our feelings. A few of us were even brought to tears at the end, which gave us a much needed sense of relief. Teaching is a very demanding and stressful profession. This workshop gave us the necessary tools to manage, and if not alleviate, the stressful aspect of it. Thank you Interdependence Project!"
– Jennifer Allen, Director of The Jack and Jill School at St. George’s Church
Meet the Instructors
Nandini Naik (She/Her) was born and raised Hindu in India. Her formal practice of mindfulness started over two decades ago with Zen meditation when she was 16 and a High School student at UWC. She had the good fortune of taking classes from His Holiness the Dalai Lama while living for months in a monastery in Dharamsala teaching Tibetan monks and refugees English. Nandini graduated from Colby College after studying Theatre & Religion and later attended NYU for a Masters in Teaching. A founding member at Emma Lazarus School for English Language Scholars, Nandini taught with the DOE in NYC for 6 years. She then worked with the Internationals Network for Public school as an instructional coach for 3 and was on their DEI committee for 2. She is honoured & delighted to be IDP’s ED; IDP has been home to her since she took her first classes there in 2009. Secretary to the Board for 6 years, Nandini also graduated from the first IDP MTT cohort of 2011 and co-taught classes & Training’s for several years.
Seanan Forbes (They/Them) is a queer disabled storyteller, writer, poet, photographer, restorative justice worker, and trauma-informed meditation teacher. Born and reared on unceded Munsee Lenape/Wappinger ancestral lands, Seanan has lived in two countries, worked in six, and done research and created art in more than forty, learning again and again there are far more bridges than barriers between us, and that kindness can change worlds. Their focuses have been on kindness, stealth meditation, trauma-informed practices, neurology, and countering our species’ negativity bias. Rick Hanson says our brains are velcro for the bad and teflon for the good. Putting that into practice, and listening to people like Rick, David Treleaven, and other teachers, they work to give people ways to alter that propensity, and watch them change everything.
Gala Narezo (She/Her) is a mother, artist, educator, activist and meditation instructor. She has meditated for more than thirty years and which has been the one thing that has consistently helped her feel healthy and productive throughout her life. Gala has studied meditation and breathwork from the perspective of Taosim, Buddhism, QiGong, Chinese martial arts (Xing Yi & Pa Kua), Yoga, Pranayama and more. She is continually looking for ways to incorporate breathwork, meditation and reflective practices into everyday life. Gala recently finished her masters degree in art education where her focus was on using mindfulness to expand educational frameworks and offerings. She is also writing a book of meditation, art and reflective practices for families and educators. Much of her teaching is based in Tibetan Buddhist traditions as well as Mexican indigenous practices and circle practices. "I have learned from many teachers who I am deeply grateful to and for," says Gala. Visit galanarezo.net to learn more.
Evy Fung (She/Her) is a native New Yorker and mom who began her journey with meditation in 2010. In 2011, she welcomed her daughter, finding herself deeply grateful to mindfulness tools. In 2018, she began the journey of becoming a meditation teacher and soon after, started facilitating with the desire to share mindfulness as a everyday practice. In 2020, her passion led her to co-found her own meditation business and set up a mentorship program that reached international participants during the pandemic. After completing the Teaching Mindfulness to Children Program with IDP in 2022, she began to create curriculums and found a deep love for teaching and spreading mindfulness within schools. Creating spaces that uplift BIPOC and LGBTQ+ teens is a special focus to her. As a program creator she connects her experience, education, and creativity to share spaces that uplifts wellness, curiosity and learning as a universal right.
Questions?
Please email Nandini with any questions at nandini.naik@theidproject.org.
We look forward to hearing from you!
Illustrations by Ellen Korbonski