ZXD ILC Philadelphia, PA (USA)
Nancy Watterson and Lan Tran, in their role as Co-Directors of the ZXD Academic Approach, have been
busy in 2018 with various academic initiatives. Their proposal, “Stillness and Motion: Using Body
Mindfulness to Observe and Connect” has been accepted for the University of Pennsylvania’s
Ethnography in Education Research Forum (Feb. 2019 with Rich Kelly and Ezekiel Mathur assisting in the
presentation). In October, Nancy and Lan presented at another scholarly, peer-reviewed conference as
part of the Association for Contemplative Mind in Higher Education (ACMHE) Conference held at the
University of Massachussetts (Amherst).
On Cabrini University’s campus, Nancy and Lan piloted the inaugural cohort of the “Balance Learning
Community” for 18 first-year students enrolled in “Conflict & Cooperation,” a full-credit academic
course which revolves around Zhong Xin Dao; the course also fulfills the Values Core Curriculum
requirement for the University. Nancy and Lan received a small grant from the 1976 Foundation to
travel to the instructors’ retreat in Oregon, offered several on-campus ZXD mini-workshops to faculty
and staff across the disciplines, conducted an on-line session for graduate students in the Masters of
Education program, and gave short interviews for the campus radio station and student newspaper.
Beyond these academic endeavors, the Philly group traveled to Baltimore, MD for the Taiwan / US Tai
Chi Cultural Exchange in May (with Lan and Inari gave a demo), gained some new members and
welcomed returnees: Lan and Nancy became disciples of GM Sam Chin at the Fishkill Intensive (Feb.
2018), 4 members (Lan Tran, Nancy Watterson, Raj Singh and Ezekiel Mathur) graded for level 4 and
Ezekiel also joined them in completing his Instructor level 1; two students (Dwight Epps and Bruce
Tomascik) recently graded for student level
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