permaculture

[Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com>]

While it is tempting to go on at length about the theory, history, and
implications of all the issues around the 72-hour design course, I think
I'll restrict my comments to a couple of practical observations. Michael is
correct that there are a number of formats that can be effective for
teaching the PDC. To wit:

Last fall Doug Bullock and I were invited to teach a 10-day course for
members of a nascent ecovillage. Their schedule would only allow ten days;
they were a mature (average age 50 or so) group of professionals with a huge
skill set among them. Both Doug and I felt  that the 10 day format was far
too rushed, did not allow for ample reflection, caused us to compress
subjects even more than in the already-rushed 14 day format, left the
students badly burned out and barely able to take in information or
participate in exercises by about day 7 (no time for a day or afternoon off)
and in general did not seem to be an effective way to give a PDC. We gave
out certificates with only a little reluctance simply because the group was
so mature, self-motivated, and had a firm foundation upon which to build Pc
information and practice. But I will not teach one again, and am skeptical
that it can be done effectively. People simply can't absorb eight or so
hours of class per day; schools and colleges limit class time to a great
deal less in recognition of that (4-5 hours is a pretty grueling university
schedule). I can work for 8 hours but I can't digest information effectively
for that much time, especially for days on end.

In contrast, Jude Hobbs, Tom Ward and I have taught a number of 10- and
11-day courses spread over a series of weekends, and I feel these courses
have been tremendously effective. Their result has been to galvanize the Pc
movement in Eugene, Oregon and to spur the creation of several great Pc
sites and a huge amount of Pc activity. The weekend format allows students
to take the material home and digest it, do a lot of outside reading and
discussion, and since the participants are from the same town, the course
benefited from the already-existing community there. So in this case, 10
days seems like it works, since there is time to digest and work with all
the material.

I'm more interested in what works that in adhering to a particular schedule.
Ten days can work given the right slowed-down format, but I cannot support a
10-day, let alone 9-day, intensive consecutive format.

Toby