Contemplative Education Network

WHAT DO WE DO AS A NETWORK?

The network is committed to advancing Contemplative Education (CE) through a multidisciplinary, inclusive, and collaborative approach, with the following key aims:

establishing a collaborative network aspiring to build a community;
promoting the cross-fertilization of scientific and humanistic approaches to CE across all educational levels, from pre-school to post-secondary settings;
advancing CE scholarship and research;
creating a consistent meeting space to forge international exchanges and collaborations;
organizing models, standards, and manuals for programs at various levels related to Contemplative Studies and CE;
fostering scientific documentation on the societal impact of CE, with the aim of presenting it to decision-making bodies for support.

THE HISTORY OF THE CEN

Prior Contemplative Educational efforts associated with Mind and Life Institute, Mind and Life Europe, the Garrison Institute, and Contemplative Mind in Society all had previously afforded venues for those interested in education to meet. However, those efforts are now dormant and the need for a consistent meeting place to gather and share ideas, scholarship and research was a primary reason for germinating the idea of a new Contemplative Education Network.

It began in seed form at the in Padua, Italy, in June 2024. At that meeting, a pre-conference headed by Chiara Mascarello, Josipa Mihić, Robert W. Roeser, and Harold D. Roth brought together practitioners, scholars and scientists from across the world and across the developmental spectrum of education (e.g., pre-primary, primary, secondary, post-secondary education) to discuss issues at the intersection of contemplation and education. A post conference on contemplative education was also held, and it was at that meeting that it was decided a new international forum would be created in the coming month.

Beginning in July of 2024, the four members of the pre/post-conference events at Padua, and Gábor Karsai, began to meet to outline the aims of such a network, to form a preliminary steering committee, and to setup a website. Surveying of participant interest has occurred several times to begin to think about how and what the network should focus on.

WHO WE ARE

Members

As of February 2026 we have 524 people on our mailing list, coming from around 30 countries around the world.

Provisional CEN Steering Committee

● Gábor Karsai - Mind & Life Europe, Switzerland; Dharma Gate Buddhist College, Hungary

● Chiara Mascarello - Ca’ Foscari University of Venice; Italian Buddhist Union Research Center, Italy; University of Padua, Post-graduate Program in Contemplative Studies, Italy

● Josipa Mihić - University of Zagreb, PrevLab, Croatia

● Harold D. Roth - Brown University, Contemplative Studies program, USA