Please help me publicize a unique program—The International Class. I began this seven years ago and had no idea how much it would help me and all its participants grow, or how powerful the impact would be on community organizers and talented educators and peformers, or what a continuous activity of generating hope it would be.

“The activity based-theory, the performative approach, and the emphasis in community building are the key elements of a psychology that blurs the distinctions between clinic, politics and the arts.” Murilo Moscheta, psychologist and therapist, Brazil

It’s a Global Learning Community

Since 2004, more than 60 community and university based practitioners from across the US and 16 other countries have enrolled in The International Class of the East Side Institute. Among them are psychologists from India, Brazil and Denmark; applied theatre practitioners from Kenya and Canada; educators, scientists and doctors from Pakistan, Serbia and the United States; community organizers from Uganda and Taiwan; psychotherapists from South Africa and Argentina; and youth workers from Nicaragua and Mexico.

Coming from different places and professions, they share a desire to change the world—and an eagerness to take advantage of the unique opportunity The International Class offers them to create a global support network, to engage the philosophical, political and psychological issues of their practice, and to study and train as developmentalists with the creators of social therapeutic methodology.

It’s a Zone of Development

The International Class is a course of study in postmodern and activity-theoretic approaches to human development and learning. Emphasis is on social therapeutics, a methodology utilized in diverse mental health, educational, youth development and community organizing settings in the US and internationally. A recognized approach within both the postmodern and the cultural-historical activity theory movements in psychology, psychotherapy, education and community and organizational development, social therapeutics is a philosophically informed, practically oriented method in which human beings are related to as creators of their culture and ensemble performers of their lives.

Designed and led by Institute director Lois Holzman, the program provides a unique opportunity for practitioners and scholars from the US and countries around the world to

• study together and learn the Institute’s cutting edge developmental methodology
• work directly with Holzman, social therapy’s creator Fred Newman, leading practitioners Lenora Fulani, Christine LaCerva and Carrie Lobman, and others
• participate in innovative educational, cultural and community-building programs throughout New York City,
• build ties and support for themselves and their communities.

In this creative playground/postmodern academy, participants build a dynamic zone of development in which they can engage the philosophical, political and psychological questions emerging from their practice.

Being part of a group that is intelligent, talented, diverse and committed to making a difference in their own parts of the world has revolutionized my work, my personal growth, and my way of relating with others. Introducing performance to our after school programs with kids, our work with youth groups, and our broader community work has opened new possibilities for the growth of everyone. Miguel Cortez, youth worker and psychotherapist, CASA, Juarez Mexico

The International Class has made me learn to challenge some of my old beliefs and to peel off the rigid self-image that we all try to portray in our life. The cultural and economic differences of all the countries of the student have made us get an even broader viewpoint on all the topics that were discussed. Ishita Sanyal, psychologist, Turning Point, Calcutta India

It’s different from other learning processes and institutions. It is an enjoyable, enthusiastic, academic environment where you may develop your emotions, thinking and speech. It is a zone where you may improve your human skills to help others to perform a better world. Ignacio Dalton, educational researcher, Universidad del Salvador, Buenos Aires Argentina

For the last eight years, I have studied welfare policy and have been an advocate for more humane services in New York City. I applied to The International Class out of recognition that my understanding of poverty was limited – and in some ways, provincial. My colleagues taught me about anti-poverty programs around the world, which helped to broaden my understanding. As an American and an anti-poverty advocate, this experience has been invaluable. Becca Widom, sociologist and anti-poverty advocate, New York New York

It Has a Flexible Structure and Curriculum

The ten-month program combines residencies in New York City and seminars, supervision and project development sessions conducted online. Students come together to work with Institute faculty and others in a broad development community and advance their programs and research.

Residencies. The International Class meets at the Institute three times during the academic year (in September, February and June) to work together as a group with Institute faculty and associates. Site visits, observations, participant observations and experiential learning activities supplement daily seminar activity.

At Home. In between residencies, students study the social therapeutic method in relation to socio-cultural activity theory, theories of performance, postmodernism, group process and community development. Learning formats include on-line seminars, mentoring, dialogues with guest colleagues of the Institute, supervision and conference calls with faculty and mentors.

The International Class is cross-disciplinary and open to practitioners and scholars with a broad range of educational and life experiences—and a passion for innovation. Applications for the 2011-2012 program will be accepted through May 2011. Tuition is $3400. A limited number of full and partial scholarships covering tuition are available.

For more information, including dates, applications and scholarship forms, contact: Lois Holzman, Director, East Side Institute, email lholzman@eastsideinstitute.org, tel. 212-941-8906, ext. 324. To read more about the program and its graduates, or to download an application, go to http://www.eastsideinstitute.org/IC.html

Here’s a blog I highly recommend—The Community Therapist. It’s written by Christine LaCerva, director of the Social Therapy Group and of the Institute’s Therapist Training. Her latest entry reports on a conversation she had recently with Anthony Rao, author of The Way of Boys: Raising Healthy Boys in a Challenging and Complex World—an event I had the privilege of moderating. The topic was working with children and families in an age of psychotropic medication. Anthony and Christine are creative and playful therapists (and people) and the conversation was an informative delight.

You can get a glimpse of how Christine works, as she provides an excerpt from a transcript of a multi-family group session with children, ages 8-12, and their parents. Here’s Christine on her approach: “You’ll see that we don’t relate to children as problems to be solved but as active participants in figuring out how to relate to their diagnoses, their emotional pain, their lives, their parents and (hint: this next part is the key) to each other.  I’ll call this particular session “The Hamburger Syndrome.” You’ll see why.”

I am happy to report that a new documentary film, Lev Vygotsky: One Man’s Legacy through his Life and Theory, is being released this month. The filmmaker is Valerie Lowe who, in addition to making films, is an adult educator, corporate consultant and staff trainer in British Columbia — and a completely lovely person. I got to know Val when she was just beginning this project a few years ago and have been following its development. 

I also got  pre-release glimpses of the film this past fall when Val showed segments at the ISCAR (International Society for Cultural Activity Research) conference in San Diego and the Performing the World 2008 (PTW’08) conference in New York City. The film uniquely combines the political-cultural history of Vygotsky’s life with illustrations of contemporary Vygotskian practices in several countries, and is comprised of interviews with Vygotsky family members Gita L. Vygodskaya and Elena Kravtzova, photographs, archival footage, and commentaries by contemporary Vygotksian scholars, Michael Cole, Lois Holzman, Vera John-Steiner, Alex Kozulin, Tamara Lifanova, Luciano Mecacci, and James Wertsch. You can view sections of the film at the website media page. (You can see about 5 seconds of me in one of them.)

It was a  privilege to have been included in “Lev Vygotsky” and, even more, to have been able to introduce Val and viewers to the some extraordinary Vygotskian practitioners.

Some colleagues and I are now planning a New York premiere of the film to take place in March or April. Watch for the announcement!

Richard House and Del Loewenthal have done a great service to mental health professionals and consumers in putting together an intelligent and cogent collection of essays that lay bare the epistemological and ideological underpinnings of CBT and the methodological validity accorded to it. The two British psychologists are  editors of the new book, Against and For CBT: Towards a Constructive Dialogue?  One of the many critical questions the 24 essays in the book raise is: “What is the balance of responsibility between policy-makers, the CBT field itself, and the “modernist” Zeitgeist for the way in which CBT has increasingly been made into the prevailing therapy of “choice” within modern Western societies?

I am very pleased that one of the book’s essays was authored by my dear friend, mentor and collaborator Fred Newman. In their overview of the book’s contents, House and Loewenthal had this to say about Newman’s contribution: “In the final chapter on epistemological and research perspectives, ‘Where is the magic in cognitive therapy? – a philo/psychological investigation’ , Fred Newman explores the connection between cognitive therapy and common sense, the relationship between common sense and science, and the interrelationships between the cognitive, the linguistic, and the post-modern turn. We are treated to an engagingly discursive philosophical tour de force that incorporates such philosophical giants as Quine, Davidson, Wittgenstein, Vygotsky and Searle – and of course, Fred Newman and Lois Holzman’s own distinctive brand of ‘social therapy’. As always with Newman’s writings, the reader is in for a journey of many fascinating philosophical twists and turn – and not least, the post-modern one.” (p. 16)

Newman’s essay — and the entire book — is a must read.