What is Akademé?

Akademé is a monastic institution committed to raising consciousness, promoting educational, meditation, and sustainability processes. Akademé practices and values are consistent with an unaligned Zen center in many ways, though our public services and access are unique.

Unlike conventional Zen centers, Akademé does not recognize lineage. We recognize a range of masteries that emerge from a combination of education, experience, expertise, the ability to express, detachment from the world of illusions, and a commitment to compassion and evolving consciousness. True to Zen tradition, Akademé is iconoclastic and averse to titles. The order of masters are called faculty. Faculty research, meditate, and report.

Akademé recognizes that each person has a unique path and is committed to helping without regard to any factor other than the desire to learn and evolve. To best service the community, Akademé commits to providing the most accurate information and example we can. This is done through regular articles and books intended to inspire critical and individualistic thinking by significantly enhancing the boundaries of objective understanding. Our literature is categorized generally into the sciences, philosophy, and Zen.

Dedicated/second order faculty forfeit all personal possessions, intellectual properties, and gains, to include personal recognition, to Akademé. Akademé pools and allocates its resources with Board approval as needed to fulfill its mission and non-profit activities as specified in the Bylaws. As with any Zen monastery, Akademé faculty are responsible for facility care, maintenance, and making the facility self-sustaining on top of their research, meditation, reporting, and other community services. The whole point of a monastic lifestyle is to provide unbiased service. Akademé is designed to accomplish that.

At present, Akademé has no facility or assets beyond modest royalties on intellectual properties. First and second order faculty and Board members will collaborate to establish the necessary resources mostly by means of gifts, contributions, and grants. As per the Bylaws, the Board will not approve any debts, nor will the Board approve any agreement that does not serve the mission or other specified non-profit activities or that cannot be managed by the available faculty.

A monk of Akademé must meet the following criteria:

First Order (Non-resident)

• Commit to a faith in objective and empirically confirmable reality
• Commit to the mission of Akademé
• Commit to providing an evolving factual understanding of reality
• Exhibit a record of content expertise
• Does not exhibit delusional ideas about reality
• Are forbidden from speaking on behalf of Akademé

Second Order (Dedicated)

• Includes all of first order, but may conditionally be allowed to speak on behalf of Akademé and
• Exhibits a record of mastery and has no entanglements with illusions
• Disavow personal recognition for their work by adopting a pseudonym
• Only utilize their birth name for non-Akademé purposes that are not relevant to the institution
• Disavow personal gains by relinquishing all assets, gains, and intellectual properties to Akademé
• Disavow all ownership by transferring ownership to Akademé
• Disavow any and all non-Akademé business and religious allegiances or affiliations
• Disavow any and all political affiliations and endorsements, endorsing only that which is factually real
• Declare residency in Akademé
• Is either free of debt or whose debts are terminated by liquidating existing assets unless good cause is shown
• Be nominated by dedicated faulty and approved by the Board of Akademé Foundation

Akademé does not endorse or proliferate specific beliefs held by any religious or quasi-religious order or political perspective. It simply provides objective information and educational materials to evolve understanding, consciousness, to promote and maintain sustainability.

Ranking

Only the second order are ranked. Ranking is based on extent of diversity in the exhibited mastery of subjects and other variables as determined by past and present members of the second order. These variables shall never include birthright or lineage of any form. The highest ranking members shall form a board of masters and elect an executive from among themselves to act as liaison to the Board of Akademé Foundation. To the Board of the Akademé Foundation, the liaison is the president with no voting privileges but all the duties as outlined in the Bylaws.

The board of masters shall also identify if there exists a fully awoken individual to whom they can look to for guidance and affirm integrity of information whose voice can speak for Akademé generally. Without such an individual, they must be particularly mindful of any actions or words publicly presented by Akademé. Such an individual must be able to adapt to all situations and be able to present a more comprehensive and advanced understanding. They may also act as liaison/president. In the absence of such individual, the elected liaison is charged with filling those duties to their best ability and forbidden from identifying themselves as anything more than they actually are.

Use of Resources

Initial use of resources is restricted to establishing a resident facility for dedicated faculty. Satellite facilities may also be approved at later times. Otherwise, resources may only be dispensed for purposes of fulfilling the mission or to fit other non-profit functions consistent with a religious institution such as wildlife refuges, animal rescues, shelters for the disabled or homeless, etc. No resources may be allocated for these secondary functions without establishing a resident facility, and all facilities shall be supervised by dedicated faculty. Regents may also approve resource allocations to hire personnel to maintain facilities as needed. Otherwise, facilities are expected to be self-sustaining units such that resource allocations increase such facilities rather than are consumed to maintain them. The goal is 100% allocation of resources to fulfilling and expanding facilities promoting the mission and functions with zero overhead. In the absence of availability or approval to do so, resources and assets are retained indefinitely.

Creed

Akademé sees the path to a sustainable civilization harmonious with its environment is achieved through evolving consciousness generally. Akademé further sees the ideal path to evolving consciousness is through the learning process incorporating accurate objective information with Buddha’s eightfold path of right understanding, meditation, effort, livelihood, action, speech, mindfulness, and thought.

Method of Worship

Our method of worship is reverence of objective reality and meditation with content, requiring a constant practice of research and writing. Akademé sees the world as what we make of it, and chooses to make the world good and heavenly. Action to make the world a better place is the method of worship. Instead of asking for better through prayer, the order acts.

Akademé’s actions consist of intellectual properties provided to the full spectrum of audiences from general to expert. These are provided for free electronically, and where they are formally published, the royalties are the property of Akademé Foundation.

Membership

The congregation is open to all faiths and parties interested in objective information to be used for personal, professional, or social growth. All persons and life being subject to objective reality are technically considered members. Akademé reserves the right to manage its public forums and publications in a manner that removes consistent detractors from its mission so interested parties can be served.

Only the dedicated second order and Akademé Foundation Board have any say, authority or rights as defined by the Bylaws and subsequent policies and procedures. No one has any rights of ownership or is allowed to gain in any way by or in their role in Akademé. No formal services such as worship, classroom style education, or ritual practices are offered. Only information, answered questions, and example are provided.

Publications provide a variable audience. Cosmology, physics, and mathematical reasoning has a definite subscribing audience of 6,569. Akademé currently publishes content in five areas. The generalized area dealing with integrity issues has the fewest publications and the smallest subscribing audience (46). Lesser philosophical content has 75 subscribers. Focused meditation content has 129 subscribers. Advanced concepts in consciousness and the science of mind has 153 subscribers. Beyond definite subscribers, distribution of publications reaches audiences in the tens of thousands.

Hierarchy and Governance

Akademé is divided into two complementary units each with its own unique methods, hierarchy, and governance:

1. the non-profit Foundation managing the business and legal affairs
   Consists of no less than three and no more than nine directors called regents. No person can be both faculty and regent. All regents are volunteers selected and approved by the existing dedicated faculty. The regents may amend the bylaws to allow themselves to approve future regents in the absence of faculty.
   
   The regents establish among themselves a vice president to hold meetings in the absence of a president or in such instances where the presence of the president presents a conflict of interests. They also establish among themselves a secretary to provide publication of minutes, and a treasurer to confirm no assets or other resources are being utilized inappropriately.
   
   Board approval is required for any dispersal of resources. Such dispersals must be requested by the president and must meet the requirements of the Bylaws. In the absence of dedicated faculty, the Board has authority to appoint a president whose only function is the maintenance of the institution until such time as dedicated faculty exist to continue the mission. Until dedicated faculty are available, no new materials or information may be published or expressed in the name of Akademé.
   
   The regents and their appointees have no standing as a public voice for Akademé. Only dedicated faculty fitting the qualifications and requirements of the second order have any such standing. Regents have no legal authority to change the requirements of the monastic order without violating the Foundation’s standing as a non-profit organization formed for the express purposes outlined by the mission and its legal recognition as a religious institution.
   
   
2. the dedicated second order
   Consists of ranked masters who can establish among themselves a board with a chief executive to act as Foundation Board liaison/president. The dedicated second order or its board defines its daily operating procedures and policies consistent with the mission, order, and Bylaw restrictions.
   
   The dedicated faculty conduct the daily operations of Akademé and recognize their public words and actions come with a high level of social responsibility. Endorsement of any perspective inconsistent with objective reality, or any behavior suggestive of aggression can have dire social implications. Faculty are forbidden from interfering in social decisions and natural processes.
   Faculty are only allowed to provide objective information. What is done with that information is no longer their business. This does not preclude them from identifying falsities or misrepresentations of fact by any party, though public disclosure may not be wise or advisable in those moments. As such, any such proclamations are made with mindful care of social consequences. The faculty have the wisdom to see that not all prima facie good things are necessarily right, not all prima facie bad things are necessarily wrong, and sometimes the path forward is inaction and/or silence.

Code of Conduct

The Bylaws provide a specific code of conduct that prevents conflict of interest and restricts dedicated faculty, regents, publications, and proclamations from achieving personal gains of any kind including personal recognition, and from alliance with any perspective other than that of natural and physical reality. Faculty are subject to the terms of their order.

Akademé holds that each person’s path of evolving consciousness is unique to them, and for this reason provides a wide variety of information services to assist across a broad spectrum. Akademé sees belief as an element of the process, discourages dogmatism in any category, encourages diversity and rational individualistic thinking so individuals can find their own path. Akademé provides a conceptual road map of the process but does not get into the details of how individuals practice.

History

Akademé bases its faith in the non-esoteric teachings of Buddhism and Zen dating back roughly 27 centuries, as it is evolved through empirical science providing a more comprehensive understanding of objective reality. Akademé does not ascribe to the concept of lineage, asserting instead that mastery comes from a combination of education and practical experience that cannot be attained within the confines of a monastic order.

Akademé faculty are an unconventional monastic order of persons who have denounced personal gains, property, and recognition to dedicate their lives to serving all other living beings. These individuals tend to be of evolved thinking who no longer fit into ordinary or even extraordinary roles in society. In a way, they are disabled by having too much understanding of how things really are. While they may not be able to function in conventional environments, they still want to contribute to making the world a better place and are willing to make the necessary sacrifices and commitments necessary to doing so.

Literature

Akademé provides its own literature (available free from home page) to enhance and clarify established texts like the Dharma and scientific reports. The literature is categorized presently into Zen practice (called Lesser Pu); philosophy (Profound Pu in proclamations and articles only); cosmology, physics, and mathematical logic (Quantum Relativity and Phase Theory Cosmology); individual and socio-economic consciousness and the science of mind (Love and Consciousness). Akademé plans to add a bio-medical division for research into those areas.

The literature of Akademé is subject to deprecation, updating, and expansion as empirical understandings are explored and evolve. At present, Akademé’s literature includes the following books: Love, Consciousness, Quantum Relativity, The Ascension, Ch’an Ching (Meditation Classic), LiJie Ching (Classic of Knowledge), runLi Ching (Classic of Ethic), Zen and the Art of.... Articles are released nearly every day in one or more of Akademé's existing categories, as well as a particular category dedicated to issues of academic and factual credibility in general. Akademé does not generally provide articles on problems without offering ideas for solutions.

Leadership

PuMa Tse is the leader of this monastic order (birth name provided on resume and credentials attached to 501(c)(3) application). PuMa Tse’s outside ordination is not relevant to Akademé, but other factors of training, credentials, and experience provided as exhibit to the 501(c)(3) application are---notably, publications exhibiting diverse expertise and mastery, and experience in objective academic integrity of an institution to include maintaining and restoring accreditation of a college.

PuMa Tse is the official voice of Akademé, provides most of its intellectual property, is charged with credibility oversight of any literature endorsed by Akademé, setting Board meetings and reporting as required by the Bylaws, and acting on Board decisions. PuMa Tse has no vote or say in the decisions of the Board. The Board and faculty coordinate but are otherwise autonomous from each other.

At present a second dedicated faculty member candidate is working to put his affairs in order to rise above the ranks of non-resident status. Since Akademé does not presently have facilities to provide residence for dedicated faculty, residency is not technically an option. The faculty will coordinate their efforts to pool and establish resources to make a resident campus/facility happen. Until such time, resources are simply acquired and retained toward that end and will require Board approval for use when it is possible. Otherwise, the faculty use their own resources to provide services.

Foreign Operation

Present operations are restricted to the United States with intent to expand operations and potential facilities to the United Kingdom and other foreign places where dedicated faculty can supervise local operations in like manner as the conduct of US-based operations. First order faculty are presently recognized in several countries, but without being of second order standing these faculty do not constitute foreign operations at this time.