SIY Organizational Teacher Certification FAQs

The trainings are similar in many ways in that they both train you to teach SIY and have the same core curriculum. What differentiates this from our standard Teacher training is that it’s also to learn how to scale and implement SIY and other mindfulness & EI based initiatives in your organization, so there will be a focus on the what and how of doing this throughout the training.

The other key difference is that this program certifies you to teach ONLY within the organization of which you are employed, whereas our standard teacher training certifies people to sell and deliver SIY to any organization.

It is still possible to self-pay for this training if you are not able to get budget or a sponsor from your company. However, you would still only be able to teach SIY exclusively within your organization. Additionally, you will still need to secure funding for the ongoing fees including co-teaching and licensing once you start teaching SIY within your organization. 

 We will have some limited financial assistance available and you can indicate this in your application.

SIY Teachers will develop mastery of the SIY program content, and deepen their subject matter knowledge in mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and neuroscience. SIY also has a large experiential component, and they’ll also learn how to guide SIY meditations and lead SIY exercises. 

SIY Teachers will also learn facilitation skills that support an engaged, attuned, and collaborative environment and experience. We also know that embodiment is essential to being an effective facilitator, and therefore is an integral part of the training- this also allows Organizational Teachers to have an impact in their organization even when they’re not teaching by modeling through their actions and way of being.

This training will also equip you with the what and how of implementing SIY, and mindfulness & emotional intelligence, within your organization, as well as the internal (individual) skills and qualities to navigate this.  

After the training, SIY Organizational Teachers will also have opportunities to participate in ongoing teacher development offerings from SIYLI (eg webinars, retreats, series focused on practice/teaching skills), etc. 

Once a participant successfully completes the program, they will be certified as an SIY Organizational Teacher, meaning that they are allowed to teach SIY only within their organization. 

SIY Organizational Teachers can teach (online or in-person) the SIY program, as well as the SIY Keynote, Half-Day, and 1-Day program versions, and SIY’s Adaptive Resilience program. In addition, they may run meditation practice sessions, host mindful lunches, and lead mindful meetings, and other activities to gain interest and support implementation. 

SIY Organizational Teachers are not allowed to teach or sell SIY to other organizations, or earn a separate income for this work. The only exception here is that SIY Organizational Teachers can teach SIY pro bono (for free) to small non-profit organizations of fewer than 500 employees, to support additional practice and impact.

We encourage you or a group of your peers to apply! We are looking for people who: 

• Are passionate about bringing SIY and mindfulness * emotional intelligence practices into their organization. They understand the unique challenges of their workplace and will be able to make connections between the SIY curriculum and their organization’s current challenges, opportunities, culture and values.
  • While this program will help support you in championing and implementing SIY, we are looking for people who might already have some involvement, or at least a vision and plans for what this could look like within your org.
• Have an established and consistent mindfulness practice, with a commitment to deepening this practice, since this is one of the core elements of our program and how we train EI 
• Have experience facilitating to larger groups of around 30 or more people, and/or experience facilitating multi-faceted and experiential programs.
• Ideal candidates may have some experience managing large scale programs and/or driving culture change. 

We are also looking for those people within organizations that are ready to implement these practices, for example:

• Established interest for (or at least an openness to) mindfulness & EI within the organization. We look for organizations that care about their employees and see the value of increasing skills for managing stress and building resilience, empathy and strong leadership.
• Organizations with the potential for scale and that can support running programs on a regular, ongoing basis (eg 2x per quarter). This also may be orgs who are looking to embed SIY as a core learning or development offering. 
• Some budget approval and buy-in from decision makers. Note that this doesn’t have to be fully in place (we know part of this case is made over time as you start to collect data and gain interest!) but some initial or potential support from stakeholders/decision makers. 

You need to be a current employee of an organization who intends to teach only to your peers in your company. 

You also need to have taken SIY (in-person or online) prior to the start of training (but you don’t need to take it before applying). Note that only the full SIY Program counts toward this prerequisite (e.g. not other SIY programs or offerings such as a keynote, webinar, Start Searching, Adaptive Resilience, etc). When completing your application, you'll be asked to state which program you have attended or are planning to attend prior to the training.

Check out our public program calendar to see all upcoming SIY programs (online and in-person). To receive 10% off the SIY Program registration, enter promo code OTC2021 on the registration page.

Check out our Community Toolkit to help you support your workplace and community (and of course yourself :)) which includes resources to:

• Lead Group Practice Sessions: A set of guided meditations and prompts by topic, and a suggested agenda, so you can offer 30-minute group meditations to cultivate greater resilience and emotional intelligence.
  • Suggested meditations and prompts
  • Sample agenda for virtual meditations session
• Spread Compassion: A workbook to learn about the benefits, practice, and explore ways to spread compassion throughout your community, as an antidote to empathic distress and a way to meet the suffering occurring in ourselves and our world.
• Resource Yourself: Tips to support yourself as you support others.