Diploma in Applied Permaculture Design 2004

1. Supporting the vision...

3. Notes from inaugural meeting 3rd August 2000 (left) and a later revisioning of the trustee role (above)

4. Yield 1: South East Convergence 2000-2002 Workshops about personal barriers to sustainability, making a windowbox, Wholism & PcDesign, plus veg stalls, info re Brighton Earthship… We had a crêche, food, entertainment...

7. We also enjoy ourselves! BPT management group & trustees Summer 2003

8. November 2003 Course numbers for BSC are low - we push the dates back to January 04 and recycle the first residential weekend into a Redesigning the Visioning session, led by Trustees

9. Our plan for the revision & flower of existing activities Trustees, management group members, recent graduates, members such as our designer

10. As the ‘client’ we list our needs and decide we have 3 targets to reach with our redesigned organisation A stronger local public face and influence Knowing our limitations and working with them Symmetry - becoming a demonstration of how permaculture organisations can work with national connections

11. positive elements and minuses...

12. We analyse our Core Function based on themes & elements

13. We find some solutions ! core function

14. We shake up our policies as another theme We decide what to do next!

15. Being a trustee Grows straight, useful In short lengths, gets cut to give new growth Makes the soil fertile and prepares for future small seeds to get sown in the ground Knows it can’t go on forever, and plans the next generation in Native species where possible or those that adapt to the local conditions easily Accepts small yield to begin, knows it will be subject to exposure

16. Pioneering... Sow at the best time, enough?… 1 evening every two weeks, we can’t do it all at once Seek a nurturing medium… find 1 year’s money to set up & administer Plan the ground… “after the Launch, do the Vision, find funders..” Gather resources … do a skills audit, group them, identify the gaps Guilds & companions… like-minded groups - affiliating What’s most appropriate … devise a checklist for quality growth Know what doesn’t grow with us … create policies to give boundaries Seek support … don’t try to do it all yourself… plan in succession

17. Forest Gardening as another metaphor … where are Trustees & management placed? perennials need feeding for long life biennials & annuals … do they self seed? nourishment & hold learning from wild zone visitors climbing to the light, threading through...

18. Being a trustee Theory in action : as can be seen from the analysis of trustees as pioneer species, we are very much examples of theory in action…within the conventions of the role as demanded by the legal constitution we attempt to use design theory & practice at as many stages as possible. We take care to take care of people, though this has proved to be a difficult balance sometimes - working with natural patterns, using energyflow, thinking of ‘niches’ for people’s talents, however diverse they may be. Sometimes it feels like a parental role, remembering that it’s a natural pattern to have ‘elders’ and ‘novices’, at other times there is more of a Guild feel - all, we would hope, are beneficial relationships. Taking care of ourselves has been the hardest… at the beginning, too few people and too much to do, struggling for light we become etiolated, depleted, it’s hard to bear fruit. As a founding trustee I was managing, teaching, coordinating, chairing… all too much, but I was able to withdraw gradually, and after three years as a Trustee became the Course petal rep for the management group… and just about to take on a Web-petal role, to gain another yield from my Diploma study. So we have had to redesign the system more than once … the Flower Petal idea was one yield from 2003, which did result in more people being involved. Re-visioning is now built in, with the new management group leading the next one in November...