Volunteer Opportunity for Mindfulness Teachers

August 11, 2023

Seeking Certified Mindfulness Teachers

We are seeking qualified mindfulness teachers as volunteers to lead an experiential small group on mindfulness and climate resilience for UC students for a new class on Climate Resilience.

Seven UC campuses will participate in this experimental pilot project. The hope and vision is for this curriculum to have a potentially major impact on students across the UC system, preparing them with tools, both personal and in support of others, to address the crisis facing us all with wisdom, compassion, and skillful action. 

The UC climate resilience class will allow students to develop mindfulness skills and deep listening around the poly-crisis/climate crisis to help manage eco-anxiety and mental health. It will provide them with advocacy skills for local action. Thus we are looking for certified mindfulness-trained leaders, ideally with a background in ecology/climate, to volunteer to teach/facilitate 8 sessions from April to June 2024 for one or more small groups. An honorarium of $500 will be provided as compensation. Parking and travel for commuting long distances will be compensated. 

If you know of someone qualified, and interested, who lives near one of the UC campuses listed below in CA, they should contact us ([email protected]) with an email header  “UC Mindfulness & Climate class” and share their resume. Thank you!

  • University of California, San Francisco 
  • University of California, San Diego
  • University of California, Irvine
  • University of California, Los Angeles 
  • University of California, Davis
  • University of California, Santa Cruz 
  • University of California, Riverside 
  • University of California, Santa Barbara 

Here are some additional details about the course: 

It is a 90-minute class once a week for 10 weeks. For some campuses, we will ask teachers to teach twice a week. The class would likely be in the afternoon but that would be determined between you and the UC faculty at that campus. We are working hard to make this in person, and paying $100 for parking or $250 for people who have to commute to a campus in a different city. 

For this inaugural pilot, we will limit to  ~40 students to enroll on each campus. Students will complete the class readings and watch the online lectures collated specifically for this class independently. Students will be divided into 2 groups (ideally ~20 students per group). Each group will be expected to attend a weekly session co-led by the mindfulness teacher and UC faculty for 90 minutes, per below. As the course facilitator, the UC faculty will likely be there for the mindfulness training opening (30 minutes) but not in all cases. 

Class session outline:

~30 minutes of mindfulness teachings by the mindfulness teacher;

~30-minute session discussions (topic of the week, reflections, deep listening); 

~30 minutes of class project planning/discussion. 

 The grading will be P/F (attendance, paper about their climate project).