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(Hartford, CT) For more than a decade, mindfulness has caused persistent buzzing and conversation among educators. But what is mindfulness? Why do so many educators want to integrate mindfulness in their classrooms? Is mindfulness the latest educational fad, or it a worthy approach?According to researcher Jon Kabat-Zin, mindfulness is “the awareness that arises by paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.” Kabat-Zinn propelled mindfulness into mainstream societal institutions, such as medicine, higher education, corporations, sports, and the criminal justice system. He focused on mind and body interactions for healing by examining how mindfulness-based stress reduction practices affects the brain and how the brain processes emotions. Kabat-Zinn’s guided meditation programs and books describe mindfulness and meditation practices in direct, applicable, and captivating terms. Consequently, thousands of individuals practice mindfulness in the United States.During the mid-2000s, mindfulness programs and practices emerged as a grassroots movement in education with the promise of reducing students and teachers’ stress levels in schools. Although healthy stress is a part of everyday life, recent demands in our education system, such as unremitting testing, and societal issues, such as poverty, can cause students and teachers to experience unhealthy stress. Unhealthy stress occurs when life’s demands outpace a person’s ability to manage them, and mindfulness practices include, but are not limited to, mindfulness meditation, yoga and breathing exercises, self-regulated behavior, and positive self-expression. Several mindfulness programs, such as Mind Up, Mindfulness in Schools Project, and Mindfulness Fundamentals, have been implemented in classrooms and schools throughout the United States and in other countries. Although empirical research on mindfulness is recent, and the conclusions limited, there is potential that mindfulness programs improve the well-being of children and youth. A 2013 study in a low-income, ethnic-minority elementary school found, showed that student behavior improved significantly in the following four areas when its mindfulness program ended: paying attention, self-control, classroom participation, and respect for others. More importantly, these gains were maintained seven weeks later. Additionally, the Hawn Foundation reports that mindfulness practices lead to increased focus, improved academic achievement, reduced stress, and an increase in emotional resilience, and these findings have exciting implications for the potential of mindfulness practices and programs in schools—for both teachers and students.CREC is on the cutting-edge of mindfulness practices in schools, leading the way by offering mindfulness classroom sessions and by co-hosting its second annual mindfulness conference with Central Connecticut State University on October 21. The keynote speaker will be Tish Jennings, an associate professor of education at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia.For more information about the conference, visit www.crec.org/mindfulness/conference.###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(Hartford, CT) For 40 years, the Center for Creative Youth has provided promising young artists with an opportunity to polish their skills at a four-week interdisciplinary arts residency program run by CREC on the Wesleyan University campus. It’s a competitive program that selects fewer than 150 students from around the world each year to participate. Students live in Wesleyan’s dorms and take classes in their areas of interest, such as filmmaking, dance, and musical theater. Students also participate in interdisciplinary courses that introduce them to different art skills, go on field trips, attend guest lectures, and enjoy performances by professional artists. The Center for Creative Youth program is meaningful, instructive, and a chance for students to find and develop their talents.This summer’s residency program recently ended, and Center for Creative Youth Program Coordinator Lisa Foss took time to reflect on the program and its impact on high school students. Q. Who participated in the Center for Creative Youth this year?A. This year, the Center for Creative Youth had 119 students, including students from Connecticut, other U.S. states, and international students from China, France, South Korea, and St. Maarten. Q. What makes the Center for Creative Youth a unique program?A. The Center for Creative Youth is a month-long residential program open to all high school students interested in exploring the arts at the collegiate level on a prestigious college campus, regardless of their financial means. In fact, 74 percent of the program’s participants receive financial scholarships.Our student population is also unique. This year, 6 percent of our students traveled to Connecticut from others countries and 20 percent were out-of-state students. The remainder of the students represented 47 different Connecticut cities and towns. Fifty-eight percent of the total student population identified themselves as non-white students. The intimacy of students living, eating, working, playing, and learning together creates an affirmational environment where it is possible to take healthy, creative risks and receive constructive feedback. The residential experience, woven with rigorous arts curricula and exposure to professional-level arts performances, launches our students forward into a world where they feel empowered to take their own art seriously and approach the arts as something essential, rather than something extra-curricular.Participants are trained to complete an arts advocacy project in their home communities, ensuring that the artistic experience is a long-lasting one and does not end when students leave Wesleyan.Q. Who are the program’s instructors?A. Center for Creative Youth staff is comprised of college professors, professional artists, and guest artists from across the nation. They’ve been on Broadway, displayed their work in renowned galleries, played music all over the world, and published work in local and national magazines.Our residential staff is comprised of artists in college or in their 20s who are advancing their own arts education at institutions throughout the country. Many of them return to the Center for Creative Youth every year to work with students, and 95 percent of them are program alumni.Q. What did you do this summer to mark the Center for Creative Youth’s 40th anniversary?We invited all alumni to our open class share day via our social media pages. We also encouraged alumni to share their pictures and Center for Creative Youth memorabilia. We will be working to generate an alumni newsletter and anticipate holding reunion and networking events. Q. Describe a noteworthy moment in Center for Creative Youth history? How has the program changed and evolved?A. Grammy Award-winning jazz artist Jimmy Greene, a CREC Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts High School alum, performed for students this summer. The CREC Ana Grace Academy of the Arts Elementary School is named in honor of his daughter, Newtown victim Ana Grace Marquez-Greene. Over the years, the Center for Creative Youth’s curriculum has been updated to meet the demands for college acceptance. In 2013, the program moved from being a five-week program to a four-week program.The Center for Creative Youth continues to refine best practices by preserving what is most valued about the program and tweaking the areas where updates and improvements can benefit the experience. This is accomplished through extensive post-program reviews, which include student evaluations, parent surveys, teacher reviews, residential interviews, and department chair debriefings.This year, the Center for Creative Youth is able to share its 40th anniversary celebration with CREC, the Hartford-based agency that runs the program. CREC is celebrating an agency-wide anniversary—its 50th. Q. Does the Center for Creative Youth have any notable alumni?A. Anika Noni Rose is a Tony Award-winning actress who has appeared in “Caroline, or Change” and “Dream Girls. She also is the voice of Tiana in Disney’s “The Princess and the Frog.” Avery Wilson was a finalist on season 3 of “The Voice,” and Matt Jackson holds the fourth longest winning streak on “Jeopardy.” Kathryn Morris starred in “Cold Case,”a television drama.For more information about the Center for Creative Youth, visit www.crec.org/ccy. You can also learn more about the program and connect with alumni by visiting the program on Facebook at fb.com/crecccy and by following @CRECCCY on Twitter. ###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(Bloomfield, CT) Twenty-one students from the CREC Metropolitan Learning Center for Global and International Studies traveled to Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands this summer to study the area’s culture and ecosystem and to visit with children who live in area orphanages. “The CREC Metropolitan Learning Center for Global and International Studies is a school of opportunity,” said Tania Thibault, a counselor at the school and the trip’s organizer. “I am originally from Ecuador. I wanted to share a little bit of me with the students.” Students left Bloomfield June 22 for John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. From there, they flew to Quito, Ecuador. They later traveled to the Galapagos Islands, spending a total of 11 days abroad. In Ecuador, the students visited Colegio Mejia. Like the CREC Metropolitan Learning Center for Global and International Studies, Colegio Mejia is an International Baccalaureate school. In addition to learning about the lives of the students in Ecuador, the visit gave CREC students a chance to practice their Spanish.During their trip, the group also delivered 25 suitcases worth of donations to two orphanages and visited with the children there, taking photos and playing games with them. The suitcases were filled with school supplies, backpacks, clothes, shoes, and other items. Visiting the orphanages was a life-changing experience for Abigail Bray, a 2016 graduate of the CREC Metropolitan Learning Center for Global and International Studies who will attend UConn this fall. The children were amazing, happy, and smiling, and Bray said CREC students were treated like celebrities while in Ecuador, especially because they were able to take pictures using their smartphones—a luxury Americans take for granted. The trip was an opportunity to get to know the people you help, added Alee Brown, who will enter her senior year at the school. It was nice to meet face-to-face rather than just sign a check, she said. The group’s final stop was the Galapagos Islands, where they explored a diverse ecological system, learning about issues of environmental management and preservation and seeing marine iguanas, sharks, and sea lions. CREC’s Metropolitan Learning Center for Global and International Studies is one of 18 interdistrict magnet schools operated by CREC. The school serves students in grades six through 12 and offers a curriculum that emphasizes cross-cultural awareness and knowledge of the global dynamic, raises awareness of the state of the planet, and fosters an understanding of the consequences of human choice. International travel is one of many opportunities students receive at the school. ###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(Hartford, CT) When a colleague recommended an energy workshop to fifth-grade teacher Chris Brown, he was intrigued.In 2013, Brown, who works at the Momauguin School in East Haven, enrolled in a one-day eesmarts workshop about energy efficiency for elementary school teachers, and the experience impacted his career. The workshop was an opportunity for Brown to improve his teaching of topics like energy, conservation, renewable energy, and efficient technologies. He was also able to connect with other educators, share lesson plans and implementation strategies, and conduct the hands-on, inquiry-based activities that he would ultimately introduce to his students. “Often professional development isn’t applicable with what you want to do,” Brown said. “It’s more intellectual. This was not that type of workshop.”Since the summer of 2013, Brown has attended other eesmarts workshops on climate change, recycling, and Project Learning Tree GreenSchools investigations. In addition to incorporating the information he’s learned into his classroom lessons, he’s enrolled his elementary school classes in the eesmarts Energy Savings Challenge, encouraged his students to enter the program’s annual student contest, and taken his students to the Energize Connecticut Center in North Haven for a tour. “The program provides me hands-on materials that I can bring right into the classroom, and the eesmarts educators support me while I put these resources in play,” Brown said. Like other educators throughout Connecticut, Brown has embraced the eesmarts program, and he, his students, and his school have furthered their energy knowledge and improved their conservation ethics by taking full advantage of all that eesmarts and the Energize Connecticut Center has to offer.The Energize Connecticut Center, 122 Universal Drive North in North Haven, is free and open to the public. Bus reimbursements are provided to school groups. The eesmarts program provides professional development; in-class, standards-aligned lessons; and outreach. It also holds an annual student contest. Both the center and eesmarts, which is administered by CREC, are funded by Energize Connecticut, an organization made possible by the Energy Efficiency Fund, the Connecticut Green Bank, the state of Connecticut, and funding from a charge on customer electric and gas utility company bills. For more information about the Energize Connecticut Center, the eesmarts program, and upcoming workshops, contact Gio Koch at gkoch@crec.org. ###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(Windsor, CT) Two CREC high school students earned international recognition in this year’s Technovation competition. Technovation is a nonprofit organization that inspires middle and high school girls to solve real problems using technology, and Marissa Guzzo and Alex Smith created an app, FEEL GOOD, for the group’s annual competition. In preparation for the competition, they also had to conduct user research, create a business plan, and build a prototype. The girls attend both Suffield High School and the half-day program at the CREC Greater Hartford Academy of Mathematics and Science. Their app addresses anxiety and emotions by providing users with strategies on how to deal with stress, along with inspirational quotes.In April, Guzzo and Smith won first place in Technovation’s Connecticut high school competition. Their app was later judged by the Technovation international board, and it was selected as one of 16 apps from the United States and Canada to compete in the international Technovation semi-finals. ###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(Hartford, CT) To help Connecticut educators better serve students with specific learning disability/dyslexia, CREC’s Technical Assistance and Brokering Services Division brought Fulbright Scholar Susan Lowell to Connecticut.The two-day workshop was held in May, and it was Lowell’s second appearance in Connecticut this year. Dyslexia is classified as a learning disability under state and federal special education law, and it is characterized by one’s impairment to read, write, spell, and in severe cases, speak. Often misunderstood, it is not a sign of low intelligence or low motivation, but CREC’s Alison Cianciolo says that educators must conduct comprehensive evaluations to determine the best educational plans for students with specific learning disability/dyslexia.During Lowell’s workshops, participants learned about effective identification and instruction for individuals with specific learning disability/dyslexia. Severity can be from a mild difficulty with spelling to a significant disability in reading. Of students with learning disabilities, 80 percent have reading disabilities, and based on the findings of Sally Shaywitz’s research at Yale University, 1 in 5 have dyslexia. Lowell says that Connecticut has progressive laws that are designed to ensure that students with specific learning disability/dyslexia are identified early and receive appropriate instruction. CREC’s specific learning disability/dyslexia workshops are a direct result of Public Law 14-39, which was signed by Connecticut’s governor in 2014.Offered through CREC, Lowell’s workshops taught participants that students with specific learning disability/dyslexia need explicit, systematic, cumulative, and direct instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Participants also learned how to make decisions in their own districts about services for students with specific learning disability/dyslexia through discussion, exploration of resources, and examination of case studies. “It was a great day,” said Simonne Lamothe, an employee of Killingly Public Schools who attended the May workshop. “This conference is invaluable. Every Connecticut teacher should take this training.” For those interested in learning more about specific learning disability/dyslexia, contact Lisa Fiano at 860-712-3897, or lfiano@crec.org.###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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(East Hartford, CT) CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School recently helped set a world record. The Connecticut State BioBlitz was held at the school June 3 and June 4, and CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School students joined members of the public and more than 170 scientists as they collected and identified 2,765 different animals, plants, and other species in Greater Hartford. The previous world record was 2,519 species in a 24-hour period. Each year, more than 200 BioBlitz events are held throughout the country. CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School, located on the bank of the Connecticut River, served as the Connecticut event’s home base this year and its hub for public programming.“We were thrilled to host this amazing educational event,” said CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School Principal Jill Wnuk. “We are a magnet school with an environmental theme, and we believe in providing our students with hands-on opportunities to learn about our ecosystem.”During BioBlitz, ornithologists logged 100 species, including bald eagles and peregrine falcons, and biologists recorded 29 species of fish, mostly from the Connecticut and Hockanum rivers. Botanists counted 631 different plants, 1,316 species of insects were catalogued, and a black bear was spotted at Keney Park. “The discovery of more than 2,760 kinds of wildlife, all within a 5.5 mile radius of downtown Hartford/East Hartford, surprised all of the event’s participants,” said David Wagner, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, director of the Center for Conservation and Biodiversity at UConn, and the event’s lead scientist and director. “We live in a wonderful area of the country, infused with extraordinary arrays of plants, birds, insects, and other wildlife which in sum, we can thank for our clean water and air, fertile soils, and foods. The event’s remarkable findings underscored what amazing wildlife can be found just outside one’s backdoor in Connecticut, and the opportunities that we have as residents for recreation, for education, for discovery.” While Saturday’s activities were open to the public, Friday’s activities were only for select middle and high school students who were accepted into the BioBlitz Jr. Scientist Program, including 14-year-old Jenna Langevin, of Hebron, and 12-year-old Rachel Dunnery, of Rocky Hill. Both are CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School students, and they said they were excited to be part of the program and to learn from scientists.In addition to CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School, BioBlitz organizers included UConn’s Center for Conservation and Biodiversity, State Museum of Natural History, and ecology and evolutionary biology department; the Connecticut Science Center; and the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. The event was made possible by a grant from the Richard P. Garmany Fund at the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving. CREC Two Rivers Magnet Middle School is a science and technology-based learning community for students in grades six, seven, and eight. In April, it was one of only three Connecticut schools to be named a Green Ribbon School by the U.S. Department of Education. The schools were honored for reducing environmental impact and utility costs, improving health and wellness, and ensuring effective sustainability education. Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy issued a press release announcing the honor.“As a school community, we care about our environment and the many species who share our space with us,” Wnuk said. “We do everything we can to learn about it and preserve it.”###The Capitol Region Education Council was established in 1966 and is celebrating 50 years of academic excellence. Working with and for its member districts, CREC has developed a wide array of cost-effective and high-quality programs and services to meet the educational needs of children and adults in the region. CREC brings five decades of experience in education, regional collaboration, and operations to provide innovative strategies and products that address the changings needs of school districts and their students, corporations, non-profits, and individual professions. CREC regularly serves 36 towns in Greater Hartford, offering more than 120 programs to more than 150,000 students annually. CREC manages more than 35 facilities throughout the area, including 18 interdistrict magnet schools. More information about CREC and CREC’s award-winning schools is available at www.crec.org....

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