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What We Do
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The Niroga InstituteBackgroundAlthough public education is focused on the a child's experience within a classroom, the experiences that they bring from outside greatly affect their performance in school. In addition to physical health and academic readiness, a student's social-emotional health is vital to successful learning. Students, particularly in overcrowded, urban public schools, lack the stress management skills and self control they need to pay attention in class, develop positive self esteem, and make good decisions about their lives. MissionSince March of 2005, the Niroga Institute has provided high quality yoga and mindfulness instruction to at-risk youth and other vulnerable populations throughout the Bay area. In 2010, Niroga's teachers, also called the Yoga Corps, reached more than two thousand students every week in area public schools, alternative schools, juvenile court placements, drug and alcohol rehab programs, and other settings where the skills they teach are needed the most and can have the greatest impact. The goal of Niroga's work with young people, in particular, is to teach them a mind-body practice that will help them manage stress, build self-control, make better decisions about high risk and impulsive behaviors, and perform better in school. Studies by public health scientists from UC Berkeley and Kaiser Permanente have confirmed that students participating in Niroga's programs in a large urban high school and the Alameda County Juvenile Justice Center experienced less stress and displayed better self-control than their peers who did not. The implications of these results are huge. Increasingly, Niroga's programs are a cost-effective and potentially game-changing strategy for reducing truancy and dropout rates, juvenile crime and violence, preventable health conditions like obesity and substance abuse, and other serious problems affecting children and the communities where they live. In the words of Richmond Police Chief Chris Magnus, upon learning that Niroga's yoga classes help students increase self-control: "Do you know what this means on our streets? It is a matter of life and death." Full Circle Fund RoleDuring Full Circle Fund's two year engagement with Niroga, team members helped the organization raise public awareness about its work and build needed fundraising capacity. ImpactFirst, Full Circle Fund participated as a one-third funder of a pilot program at El Cerrito High in Richmond, where 470 students engaged in yoga and mindfulness exercises right in the classroom for 15-20 minutes, three mornings a week. This pilot was important for reasons beyond the immediate benefits for the students and teachers involved. First, the large sample size permitted the collection of significant data about the effects of Niroga's transformative life skills instruction on the students' physical and mental health, high risk behaviors like crime and substance abuse, school attendance, and academic performance. This research demonstrated the validity and cost-effectiveness of this approach generally and Niroga's innovative classroom-based protocol, called Life Corps, in particular. The data gathered during this pilot was subsequently published in the International Journal of Yoga Therapy and presented at a major conference in Los Angeles in March 2009, and helped prove the effectiveness of Niroga's approach to reducing stress and building self-control in both low-achieving and high-achieving students. Full Circle Fund's team also worked with Niroga to design a plan for growing its individual donor base via the internet, which laid the foundation for another year of engagement in 2010. During the second year, Full Circle members continued to support Niroga's public relations and marketing efforts, and helped produce a compelling seven minute video showing the human face of the work they do with at-risk youth. Full Circle Fund's matching grant allowed Niroga to hire an experienced documentary filmmaker with a special interest in mindfulness education, Steve Schecter, to produce, direct and shoot the video at a discounted rate. Team leads Clayton Yee and Fred Schnider were involved in every aspect of the production, from the initial concept, through location shooting, interviewing subjects, soundtrack production and final edit. Shooting began in May and the video was completed in time for a screening in late July before an audience of funders and policy makers, and for presentation at an Education Circle meeting and Niroga benefit event in the fall of 2010. An unexpected benefit from this video project came to light when Schecter was able to produce a second video about Niroga's Integral Health Fellowship program entirely from footage shot during the making of the first video. The second piece was completed in about eight hours and at a very low cost. As a result of Niroga's two year engagement with Full Circle Fund, this groundbreaking organization has been able to:
Additional Reading
VideosWatch the video Full Circle Fund helped produce. |
NAME: The Niroga Institute
"What Full Circle Fund supported in this last year was unique in the country. We worked with kids in classrooms over a semester. Data found we were able to reduce stress and increase self-control. The impact of this on education is major." Bidyut Bose |
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Copyright 2012 Full Circle Fund