RUTH BEAGLEHOLE

ABOUT RUTH

​For over 50 years, Ruth Beaglehole was a leading voice in the calls to end the violence and oppression of younger human beings. As a teacher of parents, caregivers and professions in the practice of parenting with nonviolence, Ruth was a committed advocate within the human rights movement that works to protect all children. Her journey as an educator, mother, grandmother and activist is rooted in the story of her own childhood, her understanding of early trauma and the usndersatnindg that all human beings have the capacity to heal.

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People’s Playgroup

Ruth left her native New Zealand in the late 1960s with a degree in Early Childhood Education, and eventually settled in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles. There, she joined a collective of community activists and feminists, some  of whom had been part of the Berkeley free speech movement and many who demanded a radical shift in the systems and practices that dominated women’s and children’s lives. Through her work as a child care provider and preschool teacher, Ruth became aware of the inequities around access to childcare. Determined to start a preschool that would be affordable and responsive to the needs of the families in her community, her dream became a reality a few years later. In 1970, Ruth and a group of neighborhood parents founded the Silver Lake People’s Playgroup. Reflecting the values of peace and justice, the co-operative daycare center created a unique trilingual curriculum (English, Spanish, and American Sign Language) that was consciously anti-sexist and anti-racist.

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Teen Parenting Program

A decade later, while facilitating a teen parent support group at Project Nateen, Division of Adolescent Medicine, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Ruth realized there was a need for a program that would support teen mothers who wanted to finish their high school diploma. She found an opportunity at the Business Industry Adult School (now known as the Los Angeles Technology School) and established the Teen Parenting and Child Care Program. After academic classes in the morning, the young women would join Ruth in the afternoon for a parenting class and support group in the onsite daycare center. During her daily connection with the mothers and their children, Ruth witnessed the painful legacy of generational trauma. Although the staff modeled nurturing and respectful interaction with the children — especially focusing on ending the common practice of spanking — the young women needed more. Realizing that finding her voice had helped the ongoing process of healing her childhood trauma, Ruth found ways to encourage them to share their voices. Through dialogue, tutoring and mentoring, theater, role-play and other activities, the teen mothers exchanged stories of early and ongoing exposure to violence, helping them to break the cycle of shame and silence.

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Center for Nonviolent Education and Parenting

Guided by her conviction that physical and emotional punishment are violations of fundamental human rights, Ruth was determined to expand the work and enlisted the help of a few of the women she knew from the teen parenting program. Their collaboration was integral to the principles, administration and leadership practices of the Center for Nonviolent Education and Parenting (CNVEP), which they founded in 1999. CNVEP was the expression of a more comprehensive vision: to teach the practice of raising children with nonviolence as a way to bring more peace, justice and equity into the world. Based in Echo Park, CNVEP provided weekly classes in both Spanish and English — and, like Playgroup, was financially accessible to everyone. CNVEP became an expanding community of empathy, learning, support, dialogue and activity for families and agencies throughout Southern California. 

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Ruth’s commitment to nonviolence and social justice was not only expressed through the mission of CNVEP — she also wanted the practice of nonviolence to guide the internal, day-to-day workings of the organization. As most of the administrators and parent educators were made up of the young women who had been in the teen parenting program with Ruth, CNVEP’s staff consisted of those who had a profound understanding and personal experience of the work. The board was composed of those Ruth knew would hold the integrity of the mission and vision. 

Although parents and caregivers came from a wide range of neighborhoods, backgrounds and cultural practices, Ruth understood that what most adults share are painful stories they have of their childhoods -- and this is where the practice begins. A long time friend and colleague Katarina Wirangi Mataira captures the heart of Ruth’s work:

“Healing broken hearts takes a profound mind and a lot of fearless hard work. Ruth is such a healer, one who deservedly calls herself an activist for children’s rights. Knowing herself that a broken-hearted child grows up to be a parent with a broken heart, who will eventually find themselves thrust innocently onto the stage of parenting, consumed by passionate love who is then dissembled, piece by piece, by the long sleepless nights and endless domestic ordinariness of their child. Stumbling all too often upon the unconfronted brokenness inside their own hearts leading them away from connection with their child to that field of hurt childhoods, where tragedy can and does blossom amidst the mundane day to day efforts of raising a child. Desperately seeking a way back to connection.[She] reminds us that this is the real work of parenting well -- healing ourselves in order to grow the sacred connection of a parent and their child.”

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Changing the Paradigm

Parenting with nonviolence was a daily transformative practice for individuals. Still, the bigger picture emerged as Ruth envisaged a movement to create systemic change. From the beginning, CNVEP held contracts with social service agencies and domestic violence shelters, which led to numerous, and often long term, contracts and partnerships with schools, hospitals, government agencies, community and cultural centers, and faith based groups. For over 10 years Ruth was a thought partner with the Magnolia Community Initiative in Los Angeles, training and supporting the growth and development of the initiative. Through her mentoring and training of senior staff members, Ruth was instrumental in bringing a practice change model to the organizational culture of Children’s Bureau.

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Parents and caregivers also began to see the potential impact of parenting with nonviolence that was possible in addition to what was happening in their own families and personal relationships. Inspired by the changes they were experiencing within their families, those who had taken classes wanted to bring the practice of nonviolence into their schools, workplaces, as well as their cultural, religious and community centers. To meet this need, Ruth initiated the Parent Educator Certification program that would ultimately train over 300 people: parents, caregivers, teachers and principals, family therapists, pediatricians, social workers — anyone who worked with children and families.

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Parenting with Nonviolence Goes Global

As the community of parenting with nonviolence continued to grow locally, parents and professionals from other parts of the world invited Ruth to train them in the practice of raising children in nonviolence so they could carry the work into their families, schools and communities. Since 2011, Ruth did extensive work in New Zealand with the Te Mauri Tau who hold the practice of Parenting with Nonviolence within a Māori context and who have put it in Māori language. Up until 2025, Ruth travelled twice a year to New Zealand to support the Te Mauri Tau’s work through trainings and community dialogue.

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Ruth created a global alliance of individuals and organizations committed to ensuring the physical and emotional safety of all younger human beings. Along with her work in New Zealand, she has led trainings and provided support in domestic violence organizations throughout Japan. In 2016, Ruth was invited by Africa New Day to Goma in the Republic of Congo where she shared the philosophy and practice of raising children in nonviolence with parents and community leaders. In 2018, she made her second trip to Chennai, India to conduct trainings and workshops with Parenting Matters, and to support them as they developed their curriculum and practice of Parenting with Nonviolence.

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As the community of parenting with nonviolence grew locally, parents and educators from other parts of the world invited Ruth to share the philosophy and practice of raising children in nonviolence. Through her work in Japan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, India, Great Britain, as well as the annual trainings in New Zealand that is integrated throughout her vision and practice, Ruth created a global alliance of individuals and organizations who are committed to a practice of raising children in nonviolence as a way to end the oppression of younger human beings.

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Trainings and Consultations

For over 50 years, Ruth was an advocate of social justice for younger human beings, both locally and internationally — in schools, community groups, service agencies and other family centered organizations.

After stepping down from CNVEP as Executive Director, Ruth continued to promote Parenting with Nonviolence through teaching, training, program development, and parent support.

Using the tools of observation and dialogue, she provided assistance to early childhood centers, helping teachers and supervisors deepen their practice of empathy and their support of individual children’s emotional needs.

When working with schools, Ruth emphasized the importance of emotional intelligence and the practice of self-regulation in order to help teachers cultivate community within the classroom, and to encourage staff to build an empathetic learning environment for all students.

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Ruth also guided practice-change based on the philosophy of nonviolence, helping many nonprofits shift their organizational and management culture from a power-over system to a more trauma sensitive, power-with work environment.

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For parents, Ruth facilitated several long-running parent support groups, both onsite and online. She continued to offer mentorship, support and training to a broad network of parent educators.

Ruth continued to work with the following organizations until 2025:

Center for the Pacific Asian Family, an organization dedicated to addressing domestic violence and sexual assault in the Asian and Pacific Islander communities.

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Child Lane offers Early Care and Education, Nutrition, and Family Support Services to the Long Beach and Harbor communities. Their mission is to provide care in an environment where play is valued and children are supported to be their full potential.

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Elysian Heights Elementary School (LAUSD) is a Visual and Performing Arts elementary school whose mission is to provide a safe, nurturing, and child-centered academic environment where children develop the creativity and problem-solving skills necessary to be compassionate, curious, and responsible leaders of the world. Elysian Heights serves the communities of Greater Echo Park.

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California Creative Learning Academy seeks to engage children in an inspiring, challenging, and civically active educational experience that embraces learning through the arts.

Nefesh is an open-hearted spiritual community welcoming all of the identities that make up who we are and who we love.

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Born in the multicultural beauty of LA’s east side neighborhoods, Nefesh cultivates empathy, love, and justice.

In 2024, Ruth completed the A Compassionate Guide to Parenting with Nonviolence. A comprehensive teaching guide, A Compassionate Guide to Parenting with Nonviolence holds the fundamental principles of loving children with dignity and respect, while also treating parents with empathy and the understanding that parents do the best they can with the information, experiences and resources they have. The social justice component of the guide gives parents, caregivers and parent educators the opportunity to see the bigger picture: that raising children in nonviolence is part of the human rights movement. When we pay attention to the safety and well-being of all children, we can ensure the safety and well-being for our own children and our communities.

Ruth Beaglehole is the author of A Compassionate Guide to Parenting with Nonviolence, Mama, Listen! Raising a Child Without Violence:A Handbook for Teen Parents, and co-author of Nonviolent Parenting: A Parent Education Curriculum, the School Readiness Learning Module for the Northeast Los Angeles Center, and It Takes a Community, a curriculum for the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health. She received numerous awards  including the National Association of Social Workers California Chapter 2018 “Citizen of the Year” award and the Betty Fisher Award from the LA County Domestic Violence Council.