➡ Where: Online (Zoom)
➡ Date: Wednesday 18th February 2026
➡ Time: 1.00pm – 2.00pm (UK time)
We invite you to a #LunchtimeSession entitled ‘Cultivating Awareness & Resilience in Educational Leadership’.
This focus of the session is on a research study which explores educational leader wellbeing across the US and Australia, and examines how an adapted version of the CARE program supports leaders’ resilience, wellbeing, and leadership skills. Originally designed to help educators manage stress and burnout, CARE has shown a myriad of benefits. Recent studies suggest CARE-EL can help leaders improve leadership skills, self -reflection, and self -care.
The session, which will be a roundtable discussion, will be chaired by Deb Outhwaite and hosted by a guest panel who are involved in mindfulness work in the UK and US.
The panel consists of:
We hope you can join us for this discussion.
Please note, this event is free to BELMAS members and £5.00 for non-members. To ensure you receive your free ticket, please log in on the BELMAS website before booking.
If you pay the non-member fee to attend and then become a BELMAS Member within a month of the event taking place, please let us know and we will refund the £5 fee.
Registration will close at midnight (UK) on Monday 16th February 2026.
Sebrina Doyle Fosco
Sebrina L. Doyle Fosco, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor at Penn State University whose research and practice focus on promoting flourishing in schools and educational communities. She is a Certified Facilitator and Master Trainer for Cultivating Awareness and Resilience in Education (CARE), an evidence-based program that equips educators with tools for mindful stress management, emotional regulation, and compassionate responding. Sebrina has trained thousands of teachers and educational leaders across the US and internationally, and has published widely on mindfulness-based practices in schools and on the wellbeing of teachers and leaders. She recently developed a new version of CARE tailored specifically for educational leaders and is leading a research grant investigating how the program enhances leaders’ health and wellbeing and effectiveness in their roles.
Maggie Farrar
Maggie has worked in London and Birmingham in senior leadership positions for schools and local authorities. She was the director for leadership development, research and succession planning at the National College for School Leadership in England, and an interim chief executive.
Maggie has been instrumental in the development of a school-led self-improvement system in England and has led the design and development of leadership programmes that support the growth of system leadership and the development of cluster-based approaches to school improvement. She is also currently working with over 1,700 schools on a national model of peer review and school collaborative self-improvement in England with the Education Development Trust. She is currently supporting the development of the National Academy of Educational Leadership in Wales, with particular reference to their wellbeing strategy.
Maggie has worked with over 700 leaders and teachers on supporting their own wellbeing and that of others. This has included fostering practices that reduce stress, anxiety and overwhelm, and increase effectiveness, wellbeing and resilience.
She was awarded the CBE for services to education in 2014.
Claire Kelly
Claire Kelly draws on more than 25 years in secondary and further education (20 year of which working at Senior Leadership level) to inform her work as Director of Teaching and Training at Oxford Mindfulness Foundation (OMF).
OMF works in formal collaboration with the University of Oxford. As part of the OMF–University of Oxford Curriculum Development Group, Claire contributes to the cross-institution team that stewards the MBCT family of programmes while ensuring mentoring fidelity, transparent certification, and learning experiences appropriate to leaders working with complex populations such as anxiety, chronic illness, and bereavement.
She previously served as Director of Curricula and Training for the Mindfulness in Schools Project, designing programmes for staff and young people and leading teacher development in the UK, Ireland, Thailand, Hong Kong, and China.
Her teaching is grounded in MBSR training at Bangor University and the Masters in MBCT at the University of Oxford.
Most recently she has been co-developing the “Leading with Presence” programme with Maggie Farrar for senior education leaders, exploring how research-informed mindfulness curricula and ethical Good Practice Guidelines can support strategic decision-making, organisational learning, and staff wellbeing.
Todd Cantrell
Todd Cantrell, MS, Educational Administration, has been a secondary school administrator in the US for over 20 years. During that time, he has worked for over a decade to bring mindfulness-based practices and programs into his school building and to his larger school network. He is formally trained in Learning to BREATHE — a secondary school mindfulness curriculum, MBI’s, and is currently training with Dr. Doyle Fosco as a CARE for Educational Leaders facilitator. Todd has actively supported research on mindfulness-based programs in his educational setting, co-authoring peer reviewed publications and speaking at conferences about his experience.
Joining instructions will be sent out the day before the event, so please keep an eye on your inbox for these. We look forward to seeing you at the event!
We record our online events for sharing purposes on the BELMAS website and YouTube page. Please tick this box in your registration to acknowledge you are happy for us to record.
The #LunchtimeSession entitled ‘Cultivating Awareness & Resilience in Educational Leadership’, took place on Wednesday 18th February 2026.
The focus of the session was on a research study which explores educational leader wellbeing across the US, UK and Australia, examining how an adapted version of the CARE program supports leaders’ resilience, wellbeing, and leadership skills.
Originally designed to help educators manage stress and burnout, CARE has shown a myriad of benefits. Recent studies suggest CARE-EL can help leaders improve leadership skills, self -reflection, and self -care.
The session took place as a roundtable discussion, Chaired by Deb Outhwaite, and featured a guest panel who are involved in mindfulness work in the UK and US.
The panel consists of:
In case you missed this event or would like a recap, you can now watch it in full below.
A huge thank you to our guest panel for offering such invaluable insights, to our event Chair, Deb Outhwaite, and to everyone who joined us for the session.
