2010 Permaculture Graduation

Well, We’ve done it again!

We’ve rounded out our 3rd annual 72 Hour/7 weekend Permaculture Design Certification Here in Cincinnati. This brings the total number of Certified Permaculturalists in this City alone up to 44 over the last 2 years with this new batch of 14. My how the momentum keeps growing, and how could it not with such fundamental teachings as what Permaculture has to offer….. as I like to say…. It’s Living on Earth 101!  This Bunch of Graduates was so wonderful and enthusiastic, it was a joy to teach them, and its a joy to send them out into the world to start turning this place around and teaching others how to harmonize with this glorious god given planet. (How ever you want to define that G-O-D).

The preparation for this class began over 4 months ago (when the blog posts started to taper off in preparation for this glorious undertaking). All in all we pulled in an initial 17 students, 3 of which were part time and 14 full time. This took months of preparation with the help of many wonderful souls that all in all totaled to well over 15 teachers and support (of which we are forever grateful for their support, input, and participation for making this such a great experience for so many students). Of course we did have our bumps but with love and dedication I think we did a good job of overcoming them. We held the class at a couple couple different locations in Northside, one of which is the new location for OM Valley Permaculture. At this location the class installed a 20′ x 40′ lasagna Keyhole garden, that will turn hard pan compacted clay into a beautiful humus filled garden that was made almost completely of recycled materials. We also installed low tech Deer Fencing made with locally harvested Bamboo and fishing line. With so many hands at work we completed the garden in record time, just under an hour. We also planted a couple of pecan trees to mark the class graduation and to feed the next generation. We also got to explore our local park, Badgley Run, a reclaimed neighborhood that is now returning to nature through natural succession…. what a great teaching tool on natures resilience!

We also took a field trip to Greensleeves CSA, a former Graduate from our first class who has been working on applying these priniciples to maximize the production of her land. We also got to see several of these permaculture techniques in action in Northside, one, a food forest in a small urban lot, another, a community garden at Northside’s Village Green, where we got to see their Community Green House in action and of course our beloved MoBo Bike CoOp. We also got to see The Urban Hoop Houses producing greens for our local eatery, Slim’s Restaurant. We also spent one of the weekends our local urban ecovillage experiment, Enright Ridge. Here we saw a green retrofit home, a passive solar greenhouse for heating, their dispersed CSA throughout the neighborhood back yards and their new Green House that will support the CSA.

The class had a wonderful mix of teachers that came in to share their experience, whether it was international or local back yard demonstrations. Our gratitude goes out to such a wonderful crew of teachers to help make such a full experience for the students. The class had a good mix of lecture, visual, hands on, and in action permaculture….. given how new Permaculture is to the Tristate region.

The class wound out with the class breaking into 4 groups presenting their Designs for a diversity of 4 local sites in the city, ranging from small urban lots to Community Garden/gathering space, to a commercial Urban Garden, to a larger yet challenging urban site located on a steep hill. The Proposals by the students demonstrated a great understanding of putting permaculture into action and making a difference in the world.

All in all the world, nation and Bioregion are blessed with 14 more evolved minds to help us through this time of change. What more could we ask for in such a challenging time!

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