Bioregional CollegeS
"The ultimate end to a growth economy is the same as an analogous growth: cancer. But for national economies, the victims are nature, soils, forests, people, water, and quality of life. There is one, and only one, solution, and we have almost no time to try it. We must turn all our resources to repairing the natural world, and train all our young people to help. They want to. We need to give them this last chance to create forests, soils, clean waters, clean energies, secure communities, stable regions, and to know how to do it from hands-on experience"
-Bill Mollison-
“…The problem of intellectual infrastructure [is that] there are too few thinkers, academic departments, and institutions working to consider what might happen if our industrial system should for some reason fail catastrophically.”
-Julian Darley-
Imagine flourishing campuses hopping with activity and discovery, set in lush green rural landscapes, solar panels atop green buildings that mesh into the natural geography, where students learn about sustainable argriculture, ethics, physics, and welding all in the same day, and where students and teachers alike work together to figure out solutions to the most pressing problems of the 21st century.
Here at OPOA, our goal is to create an accredited "Bioregional College" within the Ohio area within the next five to ten years. We believe Bioregional Colleges could spawn a new birth of creativity, intellect, and action--that will be so needed in the coming times--by giving people a center and a place to begin the great cultural transformation from industrial consumerism to sustainable simplicity.
LOSING KNOWLEDGE IN THE INFORMATION AGE
A hundred years ago nearly 50 percent of people in the US farmed. Today that figure is less than 2 percent. This statistic is representative of a larger trend. We are losing and have lost vast amounts of knowledge and skills needed for survival and self-reliance. We no longer know how to grow plants, save seeds, fix our own automobiles, start fires with sticks, field dress animals, or many of the other skills that were once common and essential. Thus we can see how the much heralded “Age of Information” been an age of forgetting—forgetting where we came from and how we existed, along with the values that accompanied and informed these ways of existence. The discoveries of modern science has left us with the impression that our knowledge of the world is always increasing. Yet this expansion of knowledge has also masked this great loss of knowledge, and this loss is soon to become quite apparent as these skills will again become essential.
As we enter into the beginning stages of industrial civilization’s collapse, the skills of survival and self-reliance will be more important than ever. Those who have retained them will be valued members of their communities and will be sought out to reeducate the community in various aspects of self-reliance. For this reason, we suggest everybody within the relocalization movement take up the study and practice of at least one skill or knowledge which they feel they can master and teach to others. By the simple means of having each individual within a community master and be able to teach one important skill and knowledge that would be of use in a post-industrial world—a community would find itself much better prepared to deal with the coming crises.
BIOREGIONAL COLLEGES FOR SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION
However, at OPOA we envision something more organized and determined than this. We think we can and should look beyond this individual means of spreading knowledge. We believe we should immediately begin to create energetic centers of learning and knowledge within our communities. These community learning centers would rigorously study the most compelling issues and problems of our times. More importantly, they would figure out ways to deal with these coming crises within their communities by crafting relocalization plans, initiating community projects, promoting permaculture and bioregionalism, along with gaining the skills and knowledge to become more self-reliant and sustainable. This would be the essence of what we will call a “Bioregional College”.
James Howard Kunstler writes that,
"In the Long Emergency, many colleges and universities may close down, and the scale of those that remain may have to contract severely. College will simply cease to be the mass “consumer” activity it has become. The states will not be able to support campuses that have grown to the size of suburban industrial parks; the radically changing job market won’t require masses of graduates and postgrads; and the public may be too economically distressed to afford college under any conceivable arrangements. If college in some reduced form remains available to an elite, it might generate political grievance among those foreclosed from the kind of opportunities that earlier generations enjoyed. Depending on the amount of social disorder in the United States, or in particular regions of the nation, those elites might not want to self-identify by congregating in colleges for a while, in which case we may be in for a period when college ceases to exist altogether. Or higher education may become the province of religious sects, as it has before in history."
Bioregional Colleges, on the other hand, would offer a bright alternative to this gloomy prediction of higher education in the future. Demand for the skills and knowledge that Bioregional Colleges would offer—in permaculture, self-reliance, and survival skills—can only grow more and more as these skills again become essential. Creating creative, engaging, and challenging places of learning that promote a form of education that has almost entirely been lost, would give us a respectable and strategic foundation from which to build the relocalization movement.
Obviously Bioregional Colleges would be look very different than the current paradigm of “higher education.” The threats that are upon us are so enormous. We need to grow incredibly more intelligent and creative, compassionate and ethical, organized and disciplined, sustainable and self-reliant, utterly more connected to our place, our community, and the natural ecosystems upon which we depend. Bioregional Colleges, as we envision them, would play an integral role in this development—they could be the heart-center of the relocalization movement providing leadership, intellectual tools, organizational planning, community service and education, and gathering centers for the promotion of permaculture and bioregionalism. The following is a list of what, here at OPOA, we envision a Bioregional College would be…
- Bioregional Colleges would focus heavily on the study of place: the local flora and fauna, the watersheds and waterways, the local weather patterns, the soil, and the dynamics between human developments and activity and the natural processes and cycles of the local ecosystem. (Learning in classrooms would be reduced to a minimum.)
- Bioregional Colleges would teach the lost skills of self-reliance from flint knapping and braintanning to seed saving and food preservation to developing sustainable businesses, auto-mechanics, and photovoltaics design and instillation. Certification courses would be available for First Responder and Emergency Medical Technicians, Permaculture Design Certificates, Energy Auditing and Weatherization Certification Courses, Hunter Safety Courses, and Midwifery Training.
- Bioregional Colleges, in addition to teaching skills of self-reliance and sustainability, would also teach the “traditional” liberal arts curriculum including ecology, philosophy, mathematics, music, physics, engineering, writing, chemistry, history, etc. If there is time, Bioregional Colleges should work toward becoming accredited institutions. Though this is a difficult process, it may well be worth the work. Fortunately, there is a group of hard-working, committed, and intelligent people working to establish an accredited university system based on permaculture and bioregional principles that will soon holding their very first classes. We will look at this encouraging effort below. Eventually it may be possible to form our own accreditation status considering the fact that the education that Bioregional Colleges would teach would, honestly be far superior to the extremely limited learning of the status-quo institutions that call themselves “higher learning.”
- Bioregional colleges would be concerned as much for the intellectual development as the ethical and spiritual development of the individual.
- Bioregional Colleges would be inexpensive and available to all. For college students receiving their degrees, prices would be based on a sliding-scale, and with all students entering into a work-exchange contract the schools would be available to all at significantly lower costs than traditional schools. Work-exchange would allow the Bioregional College to become largely or wholly self-sufficient in terms of labor and food production. Community members would be able to take classes for low or no cost. Additionally, community currencies could be used to pay for the workshops and courses at discounted levels thus promote the use of these community currencies.
- Bioregional Colleges would be sited on locations where enough food could be grown to support at very least the college, and hopefully also with native forests and wilderness nearby where students can learn how to live close to the earth.
- Bioregional Colleges besides teaching the important skills already listed would also focus heavily on building leadership within the relocalization movement.
- Bioregional Colleges would be self-replicating as graduating students would learn how to and be encouraged to start more Bioregional Colleges across the country.
GAIA UNIVERSITY
Fortunately enough, a new and exciting educational opportunity in perfecting timing has just arrived on the higher education scene that is based on the principles of ecological sustainability, social justice, and community relocalization. Gaia University is an accredited university who will, starting in Autumn 2006, begin offering BA and MSc degrees in a variety of areas.
They are actively creating a highly flexible, inexpensive, and international system that allows the student a significant amount of freedom and control over their own learning destiny. It gives students the ability to, in Joseph Campbell’s words, follow their bliss.
The MSc. Degree in Regional Development is particularly relevant to the relocalization movement. Essentially they are seeking creative, competent, and committed folks to starting a serious and visionary school that could will greatly help the transition from industrial civilization to a healthier, happier, and more just world.
More information about Gaia University and their programs can be found at www.gaiau.org.
A POSSIBLE BIOREGIONAL CIRRICULUM
Primitive Skills
Tracking and Hunting
Hide Tanning
Pottery
Basket Weaving
Bowery
Flint-Knapping Carpentry Blacksmithing
Utilitarian Skills
Auto-mechanics
Natural Building
Hand-tool Making
Knitting, Spinning, and Weaving
Welding
Agrarian Skills
Draft Horses
Animal Husbandry
Seed Saving
Biointensive Gardening
Canning and Preserving Foods
Cooking, Baking, and Food Preparation
Social Sciences
History
Philosophy
Psychology
Political Theory
Sociology
Economics
Healing and Medicine
Emergency Medicine
Midwifery
Medical Doctor
Herbal Medicine
Physical Sciences
Geology
Geography
Biology
Botany
Physics
Chemistry
Ecology
Systems Theory
Self-Defensive Skills
Target Shooting
Martial Arts
Military Strategy
Culture and Arts
Theater and Drama
Writing and Poetrics
Visual Arts
Music and Dance
Governance and Leadership Skills
Bioregional Governance
Consensus Decision Making
Democratic Decision Making
Nonviolent Communications
Local Leadership
Community Cohesion
Energy and Building
PV Design and Instillation
Microhydro
Wind Turbines
Solar Hot Water
CREATING A BIOREGIONAL COLLEGE IN YOUR COMMUNITY
If Bioregional Colleges are to be effective they must be intellectually and creatively powerful institutions with top-notch instructors and students alike. Again, we are not simply talking about creating alternatives to traditional higher education. We are talking about creating an infinitely more rich, disciplined, and earth-based learning program whose goal is not only the education of the student but the making of disciplined and ethical community-based organization that can play a key role during the coming times.
Establishing these Bioregional Colleges, of course, won’t be a simple or easy process, by any means. We need to formulate an effective strategy to create these organizations. The following list is only a preliminary sketch of what actions we are moving toward in order to create a Bioregional College:
1. Recruitment of a core group of committed and creative founders
-Should include community leaders, professors, and interested community members
2. Website Development, Formation of Group Documents, Fundraising
3. Consider having one or more of the core group members get the Strategic Masters Degree at Gaia University
4. Start setting up Bioregional Campus
-Find temporary buildings and land
-Buy land if possible
-Start building campus using natural building techniques
5. Recruit local knowledgeable professors, seamstresses, mechanics, horse breeders, farmers, alternative energy experts, activists, etc. to teach classes.
HOW BIOREGIONAL COLLEGES CAN
RECREATE MEANINGFULL EDUCATION FOR OUR THE YOUTH
John Dewey once remarked that public education is the lifeblood of a democratic country. While we at OPOA share the belief that quality education must be available to all if we are to call ourselves a democracy, we no longer believe that our public education system, unless radically overhauled, is capable of delivering a quality education. The public school system in America is a failing institution. What should we have expected coming from a culture dominated by materialism, individualism, and superficiality? Sit in chairs. Listen to teachers. Stay indoors. Do what your told. The modern public school is, after all, designed to be like a factory, training the children in obedience and conformity.
We recognize that there are good schools and excellent teachers out there struggling to overcome the degenerating effects of society within the classroom, and who are teaching good things and inspiring children and improving their lives. However, as whole the system is bankrupt and will soon be little more than obsolete as knowing how to grow food and identify trees becomes more important than memorizing chronological order of the presidents or reading “Jane Eyre.” Kunstler has written,
"It’s hard to imagine a more purposeless activity than American-style high school in our time. I doubt that the public questions its basic premises or mode of operation any more than the public questions the economy of suburban sprawl. But high school in our time amounts to little more than day care for virtual adults in which some learning might incidentally take place, much of it of dubious value. There are any number of rationales that might explain it—ofr instance, that all young people must be prepared for college, because the knowledge economy demands a highly educated workforce. This is probably fallacious because, in fact, most nonmanual labor jobs (including many decent and useful ones) do not require anything more than the ability to write a coherent paragraph or perform a few rudimentary operations of arithmetic—which is asking a lot, by the way, as quite a few graduates of American colleges cannot do either very well. Another rationale is that secondary education is a way of usefully occupying young people who would otherwise clutter up the job market—and most states have laws that prevent people under age sixteen from working full-time jobs. Mostly, though, we don’t think much about the ethos behind schooling today. Like so many other everyday activities in America today—commuting, TV watching, lawn mowing—we accept the current model of education as absolutely normative and inevitable. It has worked a certain way for the better part of a century and nothing has really provoked us to rethink it, only to make it ever larger and more democratically inclusive.
Yet the failure of schooling in America is manifest. Our inner-city schools are in a nearly complete state of entropic decay due to the effects of our overall disinvestment in cities—the school buildings themselves are crumbling, while books and supplies are beyond the point of critical shortage—and to an array of social conditions ranging from the disintegration of families to the absence of standards of normative behavior. Whether these might all be lumped together as the consequences of poverty is debatable, in my opinion, but the effects are not debatable. These schools are not producing even minimally literate citizens with adequate social skills."
Here at OPOA, we think we need to completely reinvision the way we teach our young. We need to get them out of the dusty classrooms and into the sunshine and community. We need to give them real, useful skills that they will need. We need to setup close mentor relationships with responsible and respectable adults in the community. We need to look to giving children more independence and space to wonder and wander. We need teach them ethics and discipline and respect. We need to truly spark the unique light that each one of them possesses. We should look to a way of involving the entire community in the education process by involving community members on a regular basis as a part of “cooperative community education.” Much can be learned from the Montessori and Waldorf schools of teaching.
Bioregional Colleges, can also offer part of the solution to the breakdown of the public school system. As a core requirement of the Bioregional College, students would be involved in work-study opportunities including community service activities. This should include working with community educators on a weekly basis to build these new types of cooperative education structures.
BIOREGIONAL COLLEGES AND COMMUNITY CURRENCIES
Bioregional Colleges could be instrumental in starting a powerful community currency movement. Bioregional Colleges could accept the community currency and even give reduced rates for those paying with community currencies. Once the currency is firmly established they could also professors and work-study students could be paid a significant portion of their salary in the community currency. As more and more people seek education in permaculture, self-reliance, and survival skills, Bioregional Colleges will grow and prosper and community currencies will likewise flourish.
HELP US BUILD THE FIRST BIOREGIONAL COLLEGE
One of our chief goals at OPOA is the creation of the first "Bioregional College." By 2015, we hope to open the first institution of higher education that offers both the important academic rigor of traditional education with the necessary skills of sustainability and self-reliance that educational institutions today are simply lacking. If you are interested in working to create the first "Bioregional College" in the Ohio area please contact Ryan at ry.hottle@gmail.com. For more information on how you can donate to OPOA please visit our donations page.
RESOURCES:
WE NEED YOU!
Here at OPOA we are trying to transform crisis into opportunity. If you think that the mission and material that OPOA provides is useful and much needed during this coming time of crisis, we ask that you give what you can to support a truly grassroots movement to protect and defend the Earth and humanity during the coming times. With two full-time staff members, practically all funds are used exclusively to further our mission to help prepare the Ohio area for the coming times and to distribute free information about how individuals and communities can prepare for the coming times. Without your kind donations we wouldn’t be able to survive! To donate or find out more about how you can get involved please follow this link. Voice your opinions, solutions, inventions, suggestions, insights, strategies, and analyses at www.RelocalizationWiki.org.