Over the past 10 years, there have been significant movements in the area of contemplative education. Of particular interest is how these
contemplative education approaches can be leveraged to provide tools for supporting youth in emergency settings, dealing with difficult
backgrounds that include violence, conflict, and poverty. Within contemplative education exists the growing mindfulness movement, emerging as an
exciting supplement to existing programs that work with vulnerable populations, focusing on developing positive self, moral, social, and
emotional understanding. This paper argues that a mindfulness-based intervention, as a part of an educational program for street children in
Mexico could help them deal with their daily stressors and their socioemotional barriers to education, allowing them to truly benefit from the
programs being made available to them. Mindfulness, therefore, can be understood as a capability that helps to achieve functionings- real
freedoms or opportunities. In this ethnographic case study, for a twelve week period, I lived with a group of youth in situ, at the orphanage
where they reside, participating in daily life at the IPODERAC program in Atlixco, Mexico. Two groups of youth between the ages of 12 and 18
were assessed at this all-boys institution. One group was provided an eight-week mindfulness-based curriculum, while the control continued with
standard programming. After a year, I returned for four weeks, again living at the orphanage, participating in daily life. The qualitative
methods employed were: participant observation, regular recording of field notes on daily life and events, interviews with youth, interviews
with their educators, and student journal entries. The supporting quantitative component consisted of a pretest/posttest, using the Child and
Adolescents Mindfulness Measure (CAMM) given to both treatment and control groups. The first manner in which the boys lived and understood
mindfulness after the intervention was through behavior change and the decision making regulated behavior. The subjects felt that through this
practice they could overcome the impulsive behaviors they typically acted with and that they could provide more conscious responses. The boys
embodied this idea through self-regulating actions by using mindfulness as a mediator between stimulus and response. The second manner in which
mindfulness was lived was through dealing with the difficulties of the sadness, anger, and traumatic memories and remnants of their pasts. Based
on the intervention, they were not then free of all emotional problems they face, rather, it pointed to the fact that the boys believe that
through these exercises they found a tool for managing their often clouded minds. As a result of the practice, the boys' envisioning of their
future was also tied directly to the themes of lived experience, embodiment, self-regulation, and emotional regulation, as the boys felt that in
order to reach a point in life where able to keep a job, have better relationships, and most importantly be good fathers and husbands, they had
to regulate themselves and their emotions. Therefore, mindfulness became a viable tool to reach that future. Educators corroborated these
findings, talking about how the boys would sometimes use a language in the homes at the orphanage to better describe their actions and how they
wished to avoid their impulsive behaviors. On the 10-item CAMM, the mean difference in mindfulness gain scores between the two groups was -3.45,
with the treatment group demonstrating larger average gains (2.35) than the control group (-1.10). After a t-test it was determined that the
difference in gain scores between the treatment group and the control group was significant (p =.019), supporting the claims the boys were
reporting. My return a year later found that the mindfulness practice had largely not been sustained, although some did continue the breathing
exercises and recollection of the curriculum was largely limited to simply better decision making. This follow up visit and the somewhat
disappointing findings from it led to the several recommendations, which could help sustain the positive results documented during the first
four months of this study. First, the institutionalization of a plan that involves mindfulness at all level of the organization, especially
those working directly with the youth, is imperative. Second, given the trauma that this population of boys has suffered, an increased dosage is
likely warranted and particularly important. Third, future studies on the application and impact of mindfulness in contexts such as IPODERAC
should continue to be qualitative in nature, in order to get to a deeper understanding of the population and their engagement and understanding
of the material. A quantitative assessment is useful in measuring learning gains and is an appropriate supplement to the qualitative
work. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Education Leadership and Policy Studies in partial fulfillment of
the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2018. / November 1, 2018. / Contemplative Education, Education in Emergencies, International Development, Meditation, Mindfulness, Street
Youth / Includes bibliographical references. / Helen Boyle, Professor Directing Dissertation; Neil Abell, University Representative; Toby Park, Committee
Member; Jeffrey Ayala Milligan, Committee Member; Flavia Ramos-Mattoussi, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_661163 |
| Contributors | Martinez-Oronoz, Francisco J. (Francisco Javier) (author), Boyle, Helen N. (professor directing dissertation), Abell, Neil (university representative), Park, Toby J. (committee member), Milligan, Jeffrey Ayala (committee member), Ramos-Mattoussi, Flavia S. (committee member), Florida State University (degree granting institution), College of Education (degree granting college), Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies (degree granting departmentdgg) |
| Publisher | Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text, doctoral thesis |
| Format | 1 online resource (220 pages), computer, application/pdf |
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