Permaculture Australia’s Education Team has designed a survey to ask which permaculture courses people have done, are doing or would like to do in the future.
The survey also asks what other studies you’ve undertaken, other qualifications gained and how permaculture education has influenced your career pathway.
Perhaps you may be interested in gaining more permaculture qualifications as part of your professional development or having your experience in permaculture formally recognised?
Details received will help the Education team identify the demand for different levels of permaculture education and advocate to education providers to meet this demand.
Your contribution will help the Education team build an evidence base to support the growth of permaculture education offerings nationally.
Your responses will only be used for the above purposes and all efforts will be taken to ensure your anonymity.
You are most welcome to forward this survey to colleagues in your networks within Australia.
The survey will take just 10-15 minutes of your valuable time to complete and can be found at this link:
Permaculture is about growing food, how we live, the type of houses we build, ways in which we can live more sustainably, working with others in our community and how we deal with water, energy, soil and living things.
Permaculture is seen by many people as providing strategies to enable us to adapt to a challenging future, as it provides the framework to give people hope and empowerment and enable them to develop skills to allow us to rise to the challenges of a changing world. Accredited Permaculture Training (APT) courses are now available for schools and local communities. Certificate I and Certificate II have been developed with VET (Vocational Education and Training) in schools as the focus.
These courses are ideally suited to Year 10-12 students, with Certificate I appropriate for students with special needs and learning difficulties.
The Certificate I and Certificate II courses are very practical and students learn about propagation, pest control, irrigation, construction, soils, organic crops, re-vegetation, plant and animals systems as well as work safety and maintaining the workplace.
Community members who hold a Certificate IV in Training and Assessment can deliver these courses too, so accredited permaculture training is ideal for workers in city farms, organic co-operatives, community gardens and for people involved in the permaculture industry in some way.
School teachers or community members who have done a Permaculture Design Course (PDC) are qualified to deliver Certificate I and Certificate II, but there is also the option of doing the Permaculture Demonstrator Skill Set which involves 4 units from Certificate III to provide some good background knowledge and skills for delivery of permaculture training. These units provide enough background on permaculture ethics, principles and practices and hands-on skills, to enable teachers to plan permaculture projects in their school grounds.
You can register your interest by contacting Skills Strategies International or enroll directly online.
Skills Strategies International is a Perth-based training organisation but students from anywhere in Australia can enroll. The Permaculture Demonstrator Skill Set will typically take 3 to 4 months of part-time online work.
For more information contact Skills Strategies International Ph: (08) 6143 2180
Article by Dr Ross Mars
Accredited Permaculture Training is up and running in Western Australia, through Skills Strategies International. The first CIII was delivered by Ross Mars last year, and this has expanded to another CIII and the first Diploma this year. During last year’s CIII course, students also undertook AHCPER321 (Training small groups) and were able to achieve the Permaculture Skills Set. This qualification was the first time it was successfully offered in Australia.
One student during that course is now delivering CII Permaculture at Bold Park School. Yet another first for WA!
Currently three people are helping deliver the CIII and Diploma this year, with the aim of being more involved in the future.
Story by Chris Carroll and Virginia Solomon, February 2018
Qualifications in Permaculture are now available through the national Agriculture, Horticulture and Conservation and Land Management Training Package.
The package, that’s available for delivery Australia wide, incorporates Certificate I, II, III, IV in Permaculture and the Diploma of Permaculture.
This means that:
registered Training Organisations (RTOs) can begin to offer this training
schools can be offering recognised qualifications to their students and training their staff to teach it
students looking for accredited Certificates and Diplomas can press the RTOs to add this training
qualified permaculture people can do the same and offer to be employed to teach them at the same time.
Don’t forget that Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) is one of the pathways into this training so, if you have background and experience, think about converting these to a nationally recognised qualification.
It is up to all of us to get the word out… nothing boosts supply like a demand!
If we approach the providers, if we ask for the training, if we agitate for permaculture qualifications being included as desirable knowledge in job ads, it will happen.
Seeing the expansion of permaculture education around Australia and internationally is very exciting!
The Diploma of Permaculture (AHC52115) is intended for people working in communities, designing large projects, teaching and training to this level, strategic planning at a relatively large scale and local government/business initiatives etc. The Diploma of Permaculture is an 18 month (3 semesters or equivalent) course where participants are trained to be job-ready for a managerial career in permaculture. They are likely to be working in a leadership capacity for organisations, groups, or enterprises and in jobs involving a whole system approach to planning, design, management and implementation of integrated permaculture projects and programs, permaculture community programs, and the operation of permaculture enterprises.
Options 3 & 4 are non-formal, non-accredited awards available more generally and linked to the knowledge and teacher-pupil relationship of the PDC whereas Options 1 & 2 are accredited certified training (ie something where the endpoint is a career/job in permaculture).
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