At Sea Change Preparatory, a school in Del Mar, San Diego that not only educates junior high and high school students in traditional subjects, but also focuses on mindfulness, physical fitness, teamwork, and goal setting, they begin each day on the beach with a ten minute meditation and a mile-long swim in the open ocean before starting classes. What’s even more impressive, these kids are training to swim the English Channel as a team this summer.

John Allcock, the co-founder and Director of Mindfulness at Sea Change Preparatory, talks about the impact this kind of education is having on these kids’ lives. John isn’t just an educator though, he’s also a Harvard-educated trial lawyer at one of the top firms in San Diego and the author of Forty Things I Wish I’d Told My Kids, a book about his journey learning mindfulness.

Mindfulness has been a hot topic for a while now, but incorporating it into education is still a relatively new idea. John and the folks at Sea Change Prep are making a huge difference in these kids’ lives, so much so that it made me wonder how long it will be until a meditation practice is commonplace in both our kids’ lives and our own lives.