Transformative Learning at Meridian

By Courtney Lubell

The culture that humans have imagined into being is in urgent need of transformation. The professions of Psychology, Business, Education, and the Arts can serve to make a critical contribution to contemporary possibilities for the transformation of culture. The leadership capacities of courage, compassion, clarity, conscience, and embodied self-awareness, together constitute the wisdom and integrity required for transforming the professions and the wider culture.

The future of the earth and its people are inextricably woven together. Profound transformations are currently underway on many dimensions: personal, ecological, cultural, societal, and economic. To engage these challenges and opportunities, we must collaboratively reimagine how individuals, institutions, and societies can learn new capacities and habits of being.

Within higher education, both students and faculty are under intense pressure to acquire and transmit ever-increasing information to address these emerging changes. These circumstances often result in a focus on competencies associated with informational learning. However, the performance deficiencies in professional higher education graduates suggest that something vital is missing. The future calls for integrated competencies that enable professionals to acquire and manage vast domains of information, effectively enough to participate in wise and creative initiative.

Aftab Omer, Core Faculty and President of Meridian University defines and speaks about Transformative Learning as "learning that goes beyond acquiring information and skills to developing individual and system capabilities. This is a shift from having information and skill to being capable. Such learning always entails a shift in perceptual lenses enabling individuals and systems to inhabit new more complex and emergent landscapes."

Key leaders in Transformative Learning will be gathering in San Francisco in November 2012, at the Tenth International Conference on Transformative Learning hosted by Meridian University, where participants will gather together to articulate a more inclusive and clear vision of what we already know, and to explore what we can discover together, about the role of transformative learning in creating a just and sustainable future. Transformative Learning has a pivotal role in creating this future with Seven Billion people inhabiting this beautiful blue planet.

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