Education

Erika Rosenberg, PhD, is Director of Community and Belonging at the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University. Beginning in January 2027, she will also serve as Director of Compassion Education. Erika has deep roots at CCARE as a co-creator of Compassion Cultivation Training (CCT) with Thupten Jinpa and others and as one of CCARE’s founding teachers.

Dr. Rosenberg brings more than 30 years of experience across the intersecting fields of emotion science, contemplative practice, and education. Her contemplative background spans decades of personal practice and teaching, informing her work to help people better understand themselves and one another, strengthen human connection, and respond to suffering with greater awareness and compassion.

She is a member of the Saron Lab at the UC Davis Center for Mind and Brain, Founding Faculty at The Compassion Institute, and faculty at the Nyingma Institute in Berkeley. An expert in human facial expression and emotion, her scholarship spans affective science, contemplative science, emotional behavior, and health psychology.

Dr. Rosenberg is co-editor of What the Face Reveals with Paul Ekman and co-author of Psychology: Perspectives & Connections. At CCARE, she works to strengthen community across educational programs, build connections with compassion-related work across Stanford, and create opportunities for people to bring compassion into everyday life.

Robert Cusick is the Director of Compassion Education at CCARE Stanford University and a Co-Founder of the Applied Compassion Training (ACT) that was formerly offered at CCARE Stanford from 2020-2023. He is a Stanford Lecturer and Sr. Certified CCARE instructor and teaches at Stanford University, UCSF, Kaiser Permanente Medical Centers, and in multiple other venues.

As a long-time meditator and former monastic, Robert ordained in Myanmar (Burma) under the renowned meditation master, Ven. Pa Auk Sayadaw, and studied with him from 2003 – 2012. He has studied in numerous contemplative traditions including Soto Zen while in residence at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center, in the Ridhwan School’s Diamond approach with A. H. Almaas (Hameed Ali), and for 27 years in the Insight Meditation tradition with Gil Fronsdal, PhD and a host of others. He provides grief counseling and bereavement support for adults and children at Kara in Palo Alto, where he co-leads men’s grief groups and facilitates retreats for fathers grieving the death of a child.

Robert sits on the Board of Directors of the Sati Center for Buddhist Studies.

Neelama Eyres is the Director of Program Development at the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University. She is the Co-Founder of the Applied Compassion Training (ACT) that was formerly offered at CCARE Stanford from 2020-2023.

For the past 25 years, Neelama has developed and facilitated experiential programs for individuals, groups, and leaders worldwide. She’s trained participants to enact and apply compassion within their organizations, institutions, and communities around the globe. She is the co-author of a personal memoir which details her journey through a Compassionate Divorce.

Throughout her career, Neelama has provided training, consulting, and executive coaching for organizations including Google, Slack, MetLife, the Alzheimer’s Association, and many more. In addition, she has trained and developed facilitators within corporations, non-profits, and healthcare organizations.

She is also Co-Founder and Lead Facilitator for The Inner Journey Institute, an educational organization that has offered transformational programs across the United States, Canada, and Europe since 1999. For IJI, she has designed and facilitated highly immersive workshops and facilitator trainings geared towards helping participants embody higher levels of compassion, mindfulness, forgiveness, and personal transformation for themselves, their organizations, and their communities.

Neelama’s mastery is creating interactive, immersive, and experiential learning environments that allow participants to have a direct and embodied experience of spirituality and compassion. Neelama’s contemplative practice combined with her extensive travels throughout Southeast Asia and India have given her an extraordinary depth of spiritual experience and knowledge of Eastern traditions which, like her studies of Western spirituality, is reflected in all her work.

To learn more about Neelama visit her website.