At What Cost?

Defending Adolescent Development in Fiercely Competitive Schools

Presentation by David Gleason, PsyD

This program will consist of an overview of my recently published book, At What Cost? Defending Adolescent Development in Fiercely Competitive Schools, followed by a Q&A session and a social reception. Of particular note, since the primary research protocol I used to gather relevant information – in schools throughout the US and in international schools in many parts of Europe and Asia … over the past 3-4 years – was an adapted version of Robert Kegan’s and Lisa Lahey’s “Immunity to Change” paradigm, Dr. Robert Kegan will be in attendance at this program, too. While Dr. Kegan will not be a primary presenter, I will certainly ask him to speak about this book as it reflects a “case study” of his the Immunity to Change theory. Specifically, the ITC paradigm helped me to unearth the underlying “competing commitments” of educators and parents all around the world who, through their engagement in this structured ITC interview, “discovered” the various ways in which they are actually contributing to the daunting pressures being imposed on the still-developing adolescents, most of whom are simply not developmentally “ready” to absorb or manage these pressures… so they experience significant anxiety and depression, and with a host of behavioral manifestations of those conditions.

Workshop Objectives: 

• Describe why just giving anxious and stress-out adolescent students access to school counselors, to extra help, to executive function coaching, and to pharmacological assistance (psychotropic drugs) is NOT enough.

• Examine what educators and parents, alike – who fully admit to overscheduling, overworking, and at times, to overwhelming their students and teenaged children, need to consider in order to change what they are doing.

• Discuss the “competing commitments” of educators and parents all around the world

Wednesday, October 11, 2017 | 4:00 – 6:00 pm

AWC2 | 2 CE Credits | $25*

*Open to the professional community and the public for FREE | No CE Credits | Pre-registration required.

David Gleason, PsyD, earned an M.A. in Counseling Children & Adolescents from Boston College (1987), and then a PsyD at William James College in 1993. Dr. Gleason then served as Administrative Director of Student Support Services at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire before opening his own practice in Concord, Massachusetts in 2000. At that time, Dr. Gleason also joined Concord Academy as that school’s Consulting Psychologist. In addition, Dr. Gleason serves as Senior Neuropsychologist at Wediko Children’s Services in Boston, where he supervises pre and post-doctoral neuropsychology interns and co-teaches a professional development seminar. Finally, Dr. Gleason presents workshops and seminars at schools, national conferences in the United States, and at international conferences around the world. Dr. Gleason’s new book, At What Cost? Defending Adolescent Development in Fiercely Competitive Schools, was published in January, 2017, and is available on Amazon.com.