Global Center for the Development of the Whole Child wins award to create training centers in India
The Global Center for the Development of the Whole Child at the University of Notre Dame has received a $600,000 award from Porticus, a global philanthropic organization, to create whole child development (WCD) training centers in India.
The Global Center will serve as the anchor organization for a multi-year project with the Telangana Social/Tribal Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Societies — called the Society. The Society, a government office that uses residential education to improve educational outcomes for students of historically marginalized caste backgrounds, will work with the Global Center to implement training that integrates whole child development and social emotional learning skills in their classrooms and creates safe and inclusive residential school environments.
“This award comes at a crucial time to leverage the momentum the Society and the Global Center have built through their whole child development framework,” said Neil Boothby, the founding director of the Global Center. “This is an opportunity to equip Society trainers with whole child development knowledge and training skills so, ultimately, we can expand to service the broader teaching population and impact more classrooms across Telangana.”
The Global Center has worked with the Society over the last two years to build and operate a whole child development model for education in Telangana. Society leadership has implemented a contextualized WCD approach and asked the Global Center to support the expansion of teacher and school leadership training over the next four years. The Global Center will develop a teaching and research center to increase teachers’ capacity and evaluate the program’s effectiveness.
Over the course of the training sessions, teachers will receive virtual support, school visits and mentoring and will participate in peer-learning groups facilitated by the Global Center. This new sequential training and coaching model is designed to build out the Society’s capacity for teacher training and improve the way it equips and trains teachers. The program will gradually be integrated into a two-year bachelor of education program taught at Osmania University in Telangana.
Part of the University's Institute for Educational Initiatives, the Global Center for the Development of the Whole Child works toward its mission to create pathways out of adversity for the world’s most vulnerable children, leveraging science-based innovations and a whole child development approach. The center has research to action initiatives in 26 countries around the globe.
Latest International
- CANCELED: University to host Cardinal Pedro Barreto of Peru and Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana as part of Notre Dame ForumAs part of the 2024-25 Notre Dame Forum, Cardinal Pedro Ricardo Barreto Jimeno, S.J., of Peru and Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson of Ghana will visit the University of Notre Dame to participate in a conversation with President Rev. Robert A. Dowd, C.S.C., at 11:30 a.m. April 25 in the Smith Ballroom of the Morris Inn. The conversation is open to the public and will also be livestreamed for both Spanish-speaking and English-speaking audiences.
- ‘Who the messenger is matters’: Cultural leaders can positively influence population growthFertility rates across the world have been steadily dropping since 1950. Pinpointing the reasons is at the heart of Lakshmi Iyer's work as a professor of economics and global affairs. Her research exemplifies the kind of population-level research that Notre Dame Population Analytics (ND Pop), a new research initiative at the University, seeks to foster.
- Lessons from Venezuela’s democratic collapse: How opposition movements can defy autocratic leadersLaura Gamboa, a political scientist at the University of Notre Dame, explores how opposition movements navigate authoritarian regimes in a study of Venezuela's political transformation. The research analyzes the effectiveness of various strategies, including electoral participation, in the face of eroding democratic norms.
- U.S. Ambassador to the EU visits Notre Dame as second Nanovic Forum Diplomat in ResidenceMark Gitenstein, U.S. ambassador to the European Union (2022-25), will join the University of Notre Dame between March 22 and April 4 as the Nanovic Forum Diplomat in Residence at the Nanovic Institute for European Studies, part of Notre Dame's Keough School of Global Affairs.
- Diverging views of democracy fuel support for authoritarian politicians, Notre Dame study showsA new study from Marc Jacob, assistant professor of democracy and global affairs at Notre Dame’s Keough School of Global Affairs, found that diverse understandings of democracy among voters shape their ability to recognize democratic violations and, in turn, affect their voting choices.
- Through respectful dialogue and encounter, students learn about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and work for peaceA recent intercultural encounter in Rome enabled Notre Dame students to learn about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by meeting and talking with people who have lived through it. The trip, which built upon a Notre Dame class and a related Notre Dame Forum Series, reflects the University's larger focus on civil dialogue and the empathetic, people-first approach it has taken to teaching and learning about the conflict.