Are you passionate about helping people in your school, workplace, and community to thrive?
Do you wish you had the latest research in positive psychology and neuroscience at your fingertips, and everyday tools that would make it easy to share these insights and turn them into action in your company, community, or campus?
Are you:
Here’s the good news: after many, many requests to certify people in the work we have taught inside organizations and communities, around the world, for the last decade, to improve people’s wellbeing, we’ve finally done it!
It’s called the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing. And you can join us today.
Imagine if you could:
- Easily break down the latest science on wellbeing to help others learn how to navigate their struggles and thrive more consistently – even in challenging times.
- Give people an evidence-based, toolbox of easy-to-apply practices that can be fitted into even the busiest of days.
- Confidently create communities that can support each other’s wellbeing by using strengths-focused coaching tools that build psychological safety and accountability.
- Rally people – and even task forces to build a culture that embeds wellbeing practices across your team, workplace, campus, community, or region by using positive change approaches.
- Reliably evaluate the impact your efforts are having on people’s wellbeing at an individual, team, and community level.
- Build an economic business case and win funding for further wellbeing investments.
- Be supported by a local network of wellbeing champions who are willing to help answer your questions, provide inspiration, offer encouragement, collaborate on initiatives, and share resources.
- Be recognized for furthering your own education in wellbeing by earning a Certificate in Creating Wellbeing, alongside others in your organization and community.
The Certificate In Creating Wellbeing is a blended learning program for people just like you who want effective, evidence-based, systems-oriented approaches for improving wellbeing across their campus, workplace, or community.
Starting on January 31st, 2020 and running through to the end of June 2020, the Certificate includes onsite classes in Midland, MI, and online distance learning and live coaching calls, to give you all the resources, tools, and support you need from our world-leading positive psychology team of researchers and practitioners.
Whether you’re a school, an organization or community wanting to train up wellbeing leaders and champions, or just someone who is passionate about helping others to thrive and looking to level-up your knowledge and skills, the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing has been designed with you in mind.
Our Teaching Team
LOUIS ALLORO
Your Teacher & Certificate Co-Creator
A champion of enabling change leaders to design and deliver positive change experiences that improve wellbeing, Louis Alloro (MAPP) helps schools, workplaces, communities, and cities to build their psychological muscles and rally together to be the change they want to see in the world. A senior fellow at the Center for the Advancement of Wellbeing, co-founder of the Certificate in Applied Positive Psychology (CAPP) program and of The Change Lab, Louis is a social entrepreneur who designs and delivers highly sought after, evidence-based wellbeing and positive change learning experiences around the world, and is currently pursuing his PhD in systems informed positive psychology and social impact evaluation.
MICHELLE MCQUAID
Your Guest Coach & Certificate Co-Creator
Sought around the world for her playful approach to translating cutting-edge research in positive psychology and neuroscience into practical actions, Michelle McQuaid PhD helps people and workplaces thrive. A senior fellow at the University of Melbourne, Michelle draws on her 25 years of global leadership experience, her Master in Positive Psychology, and her doctorate in positive change to inspire, energize, and support people to navigate the mess and the magic of learning, growing, and connecting with each other, as we work together.
KATHY SNYDER
Your Certificate Co-Creator
Dedicated to improving wellbeing in the Midland, MI, community, Kathy Snyder (MAPP) is a high school psychology teacher, presenter, and consultant with a Master’s degree in Counselling Psychology and Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. Certified in the Bounce Back Better resilience program, Flourishing Skills Group, and trained in Design Thinking and Appreciative Inquiry, Kathy works with community leaders as a facilitator, coach, and coordinator of positive change across the region.
BEV WENZEL
Your Certificate Co-Creator
A disrupter of antiquated systems, with a focus on co-creating a world in which every person has the opportunity to live their potential, Beverlee Wenzel (CAPP) is the Executive Director of The ROCK Center for Youth Development and Chief Creative Director and author of Discover You™, a social-emotional intelligence and character development program for students of all ages. An active speaker, presenter, facilitator, and coach, providing professional development, workshops, and keynotes to adults and youth, Bev is a Certified Public Manager (Saginaw Valley State University), Certified Fundraising Manager (Lily Fundraising School), an Applied Positive Psychology Practitioner, and change leader.
Can We Walk Our Talk?
Committed, playful activators of wellbeing, we’ve traveled the world to learn from the masters, and then taken everything we’ve discovered to:
- Work with cities to facilitate inter-organizational expansion, and collective action, around difficult social challenges.
- Increase the resilience and Developmental Assets in over 15,000 middle and high school students, to help adolescents struggle well and live up to their potential.
- Improve levels of confidence and motivation to shape wellbeing and build more positive cultures for leaders, and their teams, across global organizations in highly VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) environments.
- Help hundreds of female leaders in wineries around the world, from head office through to the vineyards, feel more confident, resilient, and happy as they go about their work.
- Gain the buy-in of leaders across the Australian construction industry to thrive as they embraced new ways of working together.
- Be part of a ten-year positive change commitment to help the Cleveland community thrive by building a green city on a blue lake.
- Fire up 22 schools and local community organizations in the Upper Hunter region in Australia to improve the wellbeing and resilience of local kids.
- Equip thousands of out-of-school-time professionals and educators with specific and tangible tools to increase their impact while working with youth.
- Train, mentor, and certify thousands of positive psychology practitioners working in diverse and complex domains around the world.
Be it improving wellbeing across an entire team, workplace, school, community, or region, we are paid to teach and apply these skills every day. We also use them to build and grow our own business and to help us thrive professionally and personally as we navigate the messy and magical possibilities of struggle and thriving each day.
Here’s How The Certificate Works:
You’ll attend an onsite class in Midland for 1.5 days each month − We know that can sound like a lot, but it is the most effective way to accelerate your understanding of the latest wellbeing science, inspire your practices, and give you a safe guided space to pull the ideas apart and figure out how you can immediately apply them when you leave the classroom. Participants report that these onsite classes leave them feeling more energized and excited about the opportunities in front of them
You’ll meet virtually with us each week – To make sure you don’t lose your momentum after leaving the classroom, our online portal will be used to provide you with bonus lessons (videos and podcasts) to deepen your knowledge, and live coaching calls to help you stay on track in between onsite sessions. This way, you’ll never be rushing back to the classroom feeling terrible because you’ve fallen behind!
You’ll be given a video and podcast training library that is yours to – We understand that life happens and we record both the onsite classes and coaching calls, so if you have to miss something, you don’t miss out entirely. The recordings are yours to keep so you can revisit any of the lessons anywhere, at any time, as you need them.
You’ll be provided with a student manual to capture all your learning – This certificate is not designed to be just an intellectual exercise, we want you to be able to immediately apply what you’re learning in the real world. We’ve summarized all of the science we will be sharing, provided examples of potential applications, and proposed practical wellbeing challenges, calls-to-action, and written reflections in your student manual. This is yours to keep, and you are welcome to share it with others so you can pay forward what you’re learning.
You’ll build a wellbeing toolbox you can share with others – By the end of the Certificate, you’ll have built an evidence-based toolbox of everyday wellbeing practices that you can use to help your team, your organization, your community, and even your family and friends to thrive more consistently. We’ll also show you how to intelligently and playfully embed these practices into the ways people learn, work, and live together.
You’ll have online support, mentors, and mastermind groups to make your learning experience easier and more joyful – We appreciate that despite your best intentions, life is busy and creating change – even when it’s positive – can be challenging. To help you stay on track and be accountable, we offer an online support channel in the learning portal of mentors and mastermind groups – if you want them to help you maximize the value of your investment of energy, time, and money in this Certificate. Rest assured that no question is too silly!
You’ll be awarded a Certificate – It will be our privilege and pleasure to award you with a certification at the end of the program that you can add to your credentials. All you have to do is participate and learn in at least 70% of the onsite or distance learning sessions in ‘real-time’ (the rest can be made up by video recordings); reflect and connect using your student manual and classroom conversations; and share how you can apply what you’ve learned and have a positive impact for others in your final capstone project.
Onsite Dates
The course will meet for six onsite classes from January 31st, 2020, through to June 6th, 2020.
Classes are held from Fridays from 8:30 am – 4:30 pm and Saturdays from 8.30am – 12pm on the following dates:
Live Distance Learning & Coaching Calls
The course will have ten live distance learning, and eight optional coaching calls, from February 4th to June 2nd, held online via Zoom on Tuesday evenings from 7:00pm – 8:30 pm (EST).
Here’s What You’ll Learn:
Over six months, you’ll be given all the latest research, tools, and support you need to up your game when it comes to creating wellbeing for yourself and others. The course is organized around Professor Martin Seligman’s PERMAH theory of wellbeing. Together we’ll:
MODULE 1 : The Surprising Findings Of Wellbeing Science & How To Maximize Energy
- Unpack the business case for improving wellbeing and how to explain this to anybody.
- Learn how to easily and reliably measure people’s wellbeing and track the impact your efforts are having at the “me”, “we”, and “us” level using Professor Martin Seligman’s PERMAH theory of wellbeing.
- Be sure your wellbeing efforts do no harm by discovering why struggle and thriving have both been found to play important roles in improving people’s wellbeing.
- Bust the “I’m too busy” myth that brings most people’s wellbeing efforts unstuck and uncover the recipe for creating tiny wellbeing habits that work.
- Discover the golden behaviors that motivate people to eat well, move regularly, and sleep well so they can maximize their energy.
- Harness the brain’s simple learning loop that enables people to become mindful, active participants in shaping their wellbeing.
MODULE 2 : Boost Resilience & Improve Emotional Intelligence
- Learn why prioritizing positivity each day is as important as brushing our teeth when it comes to our improving our wellbeing and resilience.
- Help people to become more comfortably uncomfortable instead of supressing, projecting or becoming overwhelmed by negative emotions.
- Discover why stress is an essential element of our ability to learn, grow, and connect and how to help people challenge their stress mindsets.
- Avoid the thinking traps that lead to rumination and catastrophizing, and confidently reach for grounded optimism.
- Leverage curiosity to improve people’s emotional agility and their ability to be more alert, alive, and adaptable as the world around them changes.
- Understand why emotions are contagious and how you can positively infect others.
MODULE 3 : Develop Strengths & Feel More Engaged At Work & At Home
- Why developing strengths delivers a better return on people’s development and change efforts than trying to fix their weaknesses.
- Identify people’s neurological superpowers – the things they are good at and enjoy doing – to improve their levels of confidence and wellbeing.
- Avoid underplaying or overplaying strengths, by helping people to intelligently develop their strengths for different contexts and different outcomes.
- Activate people’s strengths by playfully aligning their strengths to create more moments of flow at work and at home.
- Learn how to spot strengths in others to supercharge relationships and navigate strengths collisions.
- Map the strengths of your team or your family to understand how you can bring out the best in each other more consistently.
MODULE 4 : Create Connections & Build Psychological Safety
- Understand why our brains and bodies are wired for connection when it comes to our wellbeing.
- Follow the simple steps to connect with anyone in a micro-moment and create an upward spiral of warmth and trust.
- Unleash the power of asking for help and being a self-protective giver to increase altruism and improve bonds with others.
- Reduce incivility and build psychological safety by teaching people to reach for generosity rather than judgement as they interact with each other.
- Learn how to reach for compassion, boundaries, and forgiveness to heal challenging relationships.
- How to map energizers and their impact on wellbeing in your system.
MODULE 5 : Finding The Balance Of Meaning & Purpose
- Discover why meaning and purpose are within anyone’s reach and how it shapes wellbeing.
- Master the easy way to craft meaning into any task, even the most mundane.
- Use folklore and storytelling to share more meaningful moments with each other.
- Create rituals for awe and transcendence to recharge people’s sense of meaning and purpose.
- Avoid passion burnout by learning how to keep people’s passions harmonious.
- Finding our best possible selves and mapping hope when all seems lost, to surface the want-to goals, willpower and way power to move forward.
- Nourish self-determination to make improving wellbeing more meaningful.
MODULE 6 : Accomplishing What Matters Most & The Next Steps For Our Work
- Leverage the way people think and feel to cultivate authentic grit, so they can fall down seven times and stand up eight times.
- Avoid the pitfalls of certain kinds of grit, so people know when the risks no longer deliver desirable rewards.
- Help people move beyond self-doubt and the stories that keep them stuck by building growth mindset cultures.
- Discover why reaching for self-compassion, rather than self-criticism makes it easier to achieve our goals in every domain of life.
- Understand why accomplishing the things that matter most can be both messy and magical
- Learn how appreciative coaching conversations can amplify the positive changes you’re helping people to create.
Is The Certificate In Creating Wellbeing Right For You?
If any of the points below describe where you’re at currently, then the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing could be a great fit for you.
Have you been:
- Wanting to improve the current level of discourse and engagement around wellbeing in your community by having the latest hot-off-the-presses research at your fingertips.
- Curious about how positive psychology or neuroscience can be applied practically when it comes to helping others around you to thrive more consistently.
- Eager to help your family, colleagues, neighborhood, or community increase their wellbeing and quality of life – even when times are challenging.
- Feeling frustrated about the tools you’ve had available to help people have the energy, confidence, and motivation to thrive, as they create positive changes together.
Whether you want to take the certificate yourself, or have a team of your colleagues take it together, we’d be honored to help you up your game when it comes to improving wellbeing for yourself and others. Be in doubt; the world needs your passion and skills now more than ever.
Registrations are currently closed.
Join us for the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing
A limited number of partial scholarships are available for Midland county community members to offset the cost of the program. Apply here. Rather than purchasing your place immediately, fill out the application form first and we will get back to you for registration.
Here’s What You’ll Get
- 6 x 1.5 days onsite classroom learning in Midland to put the latest research in positive psychology, neuroscience, and wellbeing at your fingertips.
- 10 x 90-minute live distance training workshops to deepen your learning and explore how the science can be practically applied on campus, in workplaces, and across communities
- 8 x 90 minute live coaching workshops to tailor your applications to the unique opportunities and challenges of the people you are supporting.
- A video training library of 100 hours of classes that is yours to keep, so you can revisit any of the lessons, anywhere, at any time, as you need them.
- A student manual packed with all of the science we will be sharing, examples of potential applications, practical wellbeing challenges, calls-to-action, and your written reflections.
- A wellbeing toolbox you can share with others to intelligently and playfully embed these practices into the ways people learn, work, and live together.
- Online support, mentors, and mastermind groups to help you stay accountable, and maximize the value of your investment of energy, time, and money in this Certificate.
- A certification you can add to your credentials.
- Access to a global and local community of like-minded wellbeing change leaders and champions.
Registrations are currently closed.
Join us for the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing
A limited number of partial scholarships are available for Midland county community members to offset the cost of the program. Apply here. Rather than purchasing your place immediately, fill out the application form first and we will get back to you for registration.
The Masterclass is currently closed.
Phew! We know that’s a lot to absorb!
Let’s make it simple. If you’re ready to:
- Discover the latest research and tools to help you take your ability to create wellbeing for others to the next level;
- Rally people around opportunities to help each other more consistently thrive even during challenging times – and embed this into the ways they learn, work, connect, and live together; and
- Be part of a like-minded community of wellbeing champions who are willing to support and empower each other,
then the Certificate In Creating Wellbeing is for you.
It’s our heartfelt hope that you’ll join us today.
Warmest wishes,
Louis, Kathy, Bev & Michelle
Frequently Asked Questions
Absolutely. We’ll cover enough of this research and applications, so you have just what you need.
Not at all. We’ll support you in the discovery of your personal application.
Show up, and we’ll lead you through lessons and activities to deepen your learning of this applied science.
You’ll be provided with 30-45 minutes of video content or podcasts in advance of the call. Then, we’ll jump on Zoom (an online video conference platform you can access really easily through your web browser) and spend about 90 minutes reviewing the content outlined for that lesson and participating in activities that bring it alive. Then we’ll open up for questions and reflections for the last 30 minutes. You can stay for the whole call or jump off when the teaching is done. All calls are recorded so you can revisit any part of them at any time.
Not to worry – we have your back. Everything is video recorded so you can catch up as you need, and if you have burning questions, you can submit them on the Membership Site for us to address, or come to a coaching call at any time.
Each cohort has 40 participants. Don’t worry, the group will be the perfect size so everyone’s questions can be heard and answered, so that you get as much value as possible.
It’s easy to participate in the distance learning calls. All you’ll need is:
- A computer (laptop or desktop), tablet, or smartphone
- A reliable internet connection
- A web browser (like Firefox, Safari, or Chrome)
We’ll send you clear instructions for joining the workshops in our reminder emails.
We can help! Don’t hesitate to send us an email at cert@thewellbeinglab.com and let us know how we can assist you.
You will be charged USD$.
We offer the following payment options: Paypal (account, debit or credit card payment sources), Visa or Mastercard.
If you get an error message that the transaction has been denied by the card issuing bank please call your credit card provider and authorise the payment
If you are having any issues with payment processing please send details of any error messages and a description of the problem to support@michellemcquaid.com and the Support Team will be in touch.
