Events

The Columbia Law School Mindfulness Program invites you to a meditation for faculty, staff, and students, held via live-stream on Wednesday, January 6th from 12:45-1:25pm. These sessions are oriented to beginners and also open to those more experienced with mindfulness practices, and they include guided meditation as well as discussion of mindfulness meditation. Participants are also invited to bring lunch to these sessions and enjoy their meal in community. This week's session will be led by Dr. Patricia Bloom and hosted by Professor Barbara Schatz (bios below).

To access the live-stream of this session, please follow this link.

Dr. Patricia A. Bloom, MD is a Clinical Associate Professor of Geriatrics at the Icahn Medical School of Mount Sinai, a past Vice Chair of the Brookdale Department of Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, NY, and previously the Director of Integrative Health for the Martha Stewart Center for Living at the Mount Sinai Medical Center.  She also previously served as an Associate Director of Internal Medicine at St. Luke’s/Roosevelt Hospital Center (now Mount Sinai St. Luke’s/West), Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program at St. Luke’s, and Chief of Geriatric Medicine at St. Luke’s/Roosevelt.

Her major interests include integrative health and health promotion, stress reduction, and Mind Body Medicine. She is a certified teacher of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), a curriculum developed by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts over 40 years ago and now used in over 750 health centers around the world. She teaches meditation and MBSR for patients and health care professionals at the Mount Sinai Medical Center, teaches mindfulness for professional and workplace groups (The Asia Society, Rockefeller University), is involved in research concerning the benefits of mindfulness, and lectures widely on integrative medicine and the science of meditation.  She was listed on New York Magazine’s list of “Best Doctors” for 15 years, and in 2012 was awarded the Mount Sinai Physician of the Year Special Recognition Award.  In 2012 she was also honored by the New York City Zen Center for Contemplative Care for her work in advancing integrative medicine in academic settings. In 2013 she was a Sidney Katz Professor of the Columbia University Stroud Center at numerous academic and clinical centers investigating mindfulness in England. In 2019 she was awarded the Mount Sinai Alumni Association Special Recognition Award for excellence in patient care and teaching.

Barbara Schatz joined the Columbia Law School faculty in 1985 and has directed clinics devoted to community enterprise, mediation, and community development. She also taught the Clinical Seminar in Law and the Arts and the Community Development Law Externship. She is currently teaching Representing Nonprofits: A Lawyering Skills Simulation Course. As an expert in clinical pedagogy, she has consulted with law faculties in China, Russia, Armenia, Georgia, Poland, and Hungary to support their efforts to establish clinical legal education programs.

Schatz has devoted her career to public service. More than 35 years ago, she co-founded Human Rights First, where she is now an emeritus board member. She is the founding chair and a board member of PILnet: The Global Network for Public Interest Law, which helps lawyers access tools they need to advance human rights and public interest law around the world. To honor her, PILnet created the Barbara Schatz Fellowship Fund, which gives young activist lawyers the opportunity to build their skills by working with PILnet staff in Hong Kong, Budapest, and New York. Schatz also serves on the boards and executive committees of Nonprofit New York, an organization of 1,700 nonprofits that builds their capacity for effective service and advocacy, and Trickle Up, a global organization devoted to raising people out of extreme poverty. She is a director of Bank Street College of Education, which, in addition to operating an elementary school and a graduate school, works with school districts throughout the United States to improve learning outcomes. 

Before entering academia, Schatz served as executive director of the Council of New York Law Associates (now the Lawyers Alliance for New York), where she administered a pro bono program for 1,800 lawyers, developed the organization’s community development practice, and co-founded Court Appointed Special Advocates, a program to advocate for children in foster care.