Videos

University of Melbourne Faculty of Education invited Dr. Mette Miriam Boëll to deliver a Visiting Scholar Lecture in November 2024 on “Compassionate Systems Change in Education: Fostering Hope for our Future.”

Key Timings:

Dr Rachel Colla (Faculty of Education Teaching and Learning Innovation Lead and Senior Lecturer, Centre for Wellbeing Science) 0:00

Acknowledgment of Country 01:02

Welcome 02:23

Introduction of Dr Mette Boëll Dr Mette Boell (Co-founder and CEO of the Center for Systems Awareness and Co-Founder and Research Director of the MIT Systems Awareness Lab) 05:29

Dr Mette Boëll’s Presentation

Professor Dianne Vella-Brodrick (Gerry Higgins Chair in Positive Psychology and Director, Centre for Wellbeing Science, Faculty of Education) 57:41

Vote of Thanks Professor Jim Watterston (Dean, Faculty of Education) 59:53

Closing

About 

For the past decade, The Center for Systems Awareness has worked towards compassionate systems change – primarily in the field of education – with thousands of people from all over the world. Most “systems change” efforts fail to produce the aspired change, often because of a lack of attention to the inner workings of human beings, including how we need to change our ways of showing up, of thinking and feeling in order for the systems we inhabit (and persistently reenact) to change.

The MIT Systems Awareness Lab study these processes as “living systems change” – in the hope that “re-enlivening” the structures of institutions and society will allow us to more consistently see outcomes of human and planetary flourishing. This is the team’s response to the poly-crisis of our time. In this presentation, Dr Boëll explores the multiple ways in which collaborative structures and transdisciplinary designs may bring people into community and work towards a different trajectory for our future together.

Mette Boëll, Peter Senge and their colleagues at MIT have been leading significant systems change in education, building capabilities to address the systemic challenges facing our education systems across the globe. They have worked with large education systems, as well as individual schools and leaders in both the global north and south, providing unique insights of what is needed to enable flourishing in education.

Presenter Bio: Mette Miriam Boëll is the Co-founder and CEO of the Center for Systems Awareness and the Co-Founder and Research Director of the MIT Systems Awareness Lab. Their primary focus is on growing a global movement focused on compassionate systems change for education. Dr Boëll is a biologist specialized in the evolution of complex social systems, play behavior, philosophy of nature and contemplative leadership. In 2018, Boëll joined MIT as a Visiting Research Scientist. In 2022, Boëll co-founded The MIT Systems Awareness Lab with Peter Senge. The Lab develops Systems Awareness methodologies and convenes partners in exploration of structural change.