Children
in Permaculture European Project
This
interview took place between Joe Atkinson and Lusi Alderslowe in
early April 2015, it's about the innovative European children in permaculture project outlined in Permaculture Works issue 124.
J:
Who came up with the idea for the project and how??
L:
Thanks to your European Permaculture Teachers (EPT) project which
delivered excellent resources and connected people from different
countries in inspirational ways... But, participants recognised that
the EPT did not have any focus on working with children under 12
years. Thus Gaye from Turkey (living in Finland) worked with Rakesh
(from London) to initiate a network of people in Europe who were
dedicated to the vision of creating resources (like curricula,
activities, session plans, handouts, posters etc) for sharing
permaculture with children. Martina (Czech) and Tomi (Slovenia) were
instrumental from when Gaye met them in Slovenia in 2012.
J:
How did the partnership come together, and who else is involved?
L:
When Rakesh and Gaye put the shout-out, 14 organisations applied,
from which we shortlisted and selected a variety which met our
criteria and Erasmus' priorities. In the end we applied to Erasmus
with a partnership of 7 organisations, 5 NGOs from UK (PA), Slovenia,
Italy, Czech Republic, Romania; and a local state school in Scotland
(Gatehouse Primary and Nursery) and an NGO who runs a kindergarten in
Romania. Gaye is strongly involved but doesn't currently have an
organisation so will be included in innovative ways.
In
November 2014, 1-2 representatives from each organisation met in
London in Rakesh's house (and LAND Centre) for a 2 day sociocracy
training course, and to set a good foundation for how we will work
together for the coming months, and hopefully years. This was
followed by a 3 day meeting in which we established the groups
vision, mission and aims, and discussed the activities which we would
like funding for. We also laughed and hugged a lot, making sure that
we had the friendships and trust we needed to create a high quality
application for European funding.
J:What
challenges did you face while writing the application, and how did
you overcome them?
L: At
our meeting in November, we set ourselves the target of completing
the first draft of the application by the end of January, ready to
send to people who could advise on how to tweak it. So after the
meeting, the funding circle had many Skype meetings - And a few!!! At
the end of January, we were still consenting to SMARTE Goals
(Specific, Measurable, Agreed-upon, Realistic, Timebound and Ethical)
and timelines. This was agreed to using consent, but later changed in
fairly minor ways for practical reasons. The deadline for Erasmus was
31st March, and we only had a first draft ready one week
before the deadline - and that was a big stretch! - Phew!
When
we sent the first draft to different people with more experience than
us to comment, they each gave different responses, some of which we
agreed with, and some we didn't! This was definitely a challenge, and
with only a week to go, and an ambition to agree to everything by
consent – this was a combination which was simply impossible!! In
the end many unilateral or bilateral decisions were made, some as
late as 4:30am when we both had to be up again at 7am - to lead a
workshop!!!
Yet,
we got the application completed with all the questions asked – all
84 pages of it agreed and submitted a few hours before the deadline
(at 00:30) - no mean feat!.
J:
What is the plan?
L:
We now have a plan A and a plan B depending on whether we get the
funding, but either way we will be developing best practice for
sharing permaculture with kids, and finding ways to share this with
others.
Plan
A (with funding) includes the following 'intellectual outputs':
- developing a website with a database in which practitioners can share their lesson plans and activities
- researching current resources
- creating case studies
- creating a film about children in permaculture
- publishing a manual which includes a tried and tested curriculum with associated lesson plans, activities, methodological guidelines, and dissemination strategies.
- Writing a training course which will be publically available for permaculture educators to introduce school & kindergarten teachers to permaculture and our resources, enabling educators around the world to access the resources.
We
will also be meeting face to face annually, running training courses
for permaculture educators, and a pupil exchange to Romania.
Plan
B – we will create a newsletter and continue to link people who are
interested in Children in Permaculture. The first exciting
opportunity for this is at the International Permaculture Convergence
in London (more details below).
J:
What happens next?
L: A
few things:
1) We wait to hear from Erasmus+ and respond to any further questions
they may have.
2) We get really excited about IPCUK in London in September!
Because we will organise a way for permaculture educators who work
with kids from around the world to get together and share their
favourite sessions, and get feedback on it. This is an idea I had
during the meeting in November and lots of people are very excited
about it already – if you are interested, please do get in touch
youngpeople@ipcuk.events and read here for more.
3)
Newsletter – we will be creating a newsletter and mailing list to
keep folks in touch – again if you are interested, please get in
touch, making it clear that you are interested in the Children in
Permaculture newsletter scotland@permaculture.org.uk
