The Institutes

The college is organized by Institutes based on different interests and concentration. The Institutes will include but are not be limited to the following:

The Teacher Training Institute at Dharmakirti College is a rigorous program of study grounded in the Drikung Kagyu tradition and enriched with studies and practices from other Tibetan Buddhist traditions, as well as western science, pedagogy and leadership.

The curriculum follows six levels of coursework designed to develop practitioners who are fully qualified to teach the dharma and continue the lineage in the West. The levels correspond to four years of undergraduate and two years of graduate level study. Serious students who don't want to complete the whole curriculum but would like to follow the rigorous program of study and practice up to a certain level are also welcome to participate.

Just like many centuries ago when Buddhism was introduced to Tibetan culture, Tibetan Buddhism is now facing the challenge of finding a form in the West that would be appropriate for the Western culture. In this process, HH The Dalai Lama and other Buddhist teachers emphasize the similarities between Western scientific and Buddhist modes of inquiry into the nature of mind and phenomena in general. Since we believe that these common interests between Buddhism and science will be instrumental in shaping a form of Vajrayana Buddhism that is accessible to a Western practitioner, we want to support such interactions through the activities of The Dharmakirti College Research Institute. The focus of the Institute is the integration of the Buddhist tradition of investigating the mind with the rigorous scientific investigation of cognitive changes resulting from meditation practice. The activities of the Institute include public lectures by prominent scientists conducting research on Buddhist meditation, basic research projects investigating cognitive changes as a consequence of meditation and applied projects to make current developments in meditation research accessible to practitioners.

Devoted to training translator-practitioners and translating Tibetan texts into western languages.

An Institute committed to the preservation, documentation and teaching of traditional Tibetan healing practices, tools, and medicines.

Publishing House will publish materials produced by the College.

Dharmakirti Library will be a world-class library of Tibetan and translated texts.

An affiliated monastery in Tibet.