About Bret

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Biography

Bret Stephenson M.A., is the author of From Boys to Men: Spiritual Rites of Passage in an Indulgent Age. He has been a counselor of at-risk and high-risk adolescents for more than ninenteen years. Bret has worked in residential treatment, clinical counseling agencies, group homes, private counseling, foster parent training, Independent Living Program, and managed mentoring and tutoring programs. He has been a presenter and speaker at numerous national and international conferences and workshops, including the International Transpersonal Association's Youth Conferences in America and Ireland, the United Nations World Peace Festival, and the World Children’s Summit.

Presentations at the Association of Transpersonal Psychology's annual conferences have included Transpersonal Approaches to Working with High-Risk Youth, and Western Adolescence: Shadow of the Patriarchy. He has been a presenter at the National Foster Parent Association annual conference and multiple California State Foster Parent Association conferences as well as the Indiana and Iowa Foster Care annual conferences. He is a Global Program Faculty Mentor for the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. As a men's group facilitator, he has also led workshops in the U.S. as well as Switzerland. Bret has worked with teens from more than 100 countries.

Bret was recently Director of Special Projects for Foster/Kinship Care Education and the Independent Living Program at Lake Tahoe Community College. He has been pioneering the use of Internet based systems intended to deliver distance education classes for rural providers and group home staff, and previously launched a teen web project through the Independent Living Program in which the web content and construction of the web page was completed by ILP teens only. He designed and taught on-line classes on Understanding Adolescence, Reactive Attachment Disorder, and Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Bret is currently also working with the California Conservation Corps, providing anger management training and case management services. He is currently a case manager for Rite of Passage, Inc. in Nevada where he is the founder and director of the Str8 Up student-business project. In addition, he is on the Global Passageways Intergenerational Advisory Council project based in Washington DC.

In June 2004, Bret once again headed the teen module of the International Transpersonal Association's Youth Conference in Palm Springs. In July 2005 he headed the teen component for the Institute of Noetic Sciences’ first Youth Conference in Washington DC. Bret is the founder and Executive Director of Labyrinth Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to adolescent services and programs. Bret and Labyrinth Center are currently creating youth employment and youth entrepreneurial models.

Bret is providing services for the following organizations:




	I strongly support Rick Belden's book and views onhealthy masculinity..... Check out this powerful and healing book at: http://rickbelden.com/

To view Bret's current reading list of boys and men's issues, click here.

To review Bret's training history, click here.

Woodworking has been my "mental health" piece for years. A skill I picked up after bailing on my corporate career, I learned that woodworking helps give me closure in a field and career filled with never-ending clients. Woodworking also teaches patience, having to work with organic materials that continuously change with the environment, as well as with sharp tools (I've donated a few fingertips!).

Also, woodworking is a great example of a medium that has no one right way, no single approach to a problem. Sequencing is critical, for if you make a wrong cut or a cut out of turn, you can't add more clay or paint and start again. Woodworking continues to challenge my problem solving skills and reminds me to be patient, persistent, and creative. To see more of my second passion, click the box above...

For more information, contact Bret.

Last Updated March 29, 2008