Earth Activist Training (Full PDC)
Family-Friendly & Bilingual @ Grain&Sens (France)
Event Date:
01/08/2025
to
14/08/2025
Registration End Date:
31/07/2025
Event Location:
Ecovillage Grain&Sens, Lavenant, 07440 Boffres, France
Event Type:
In Person
Earth Activist Training and 12P Permaculture Design are happy to invite you to a two-week intensive Permaculture Design Course (PDC), offering the internationally-recognised 72-hour permaculture curriculum with an additional focus on social permaculture, organizing tools, and spirit. This will be the first training Starhawk and Alfred have offered in Europe that is family-friendly (bring the kids!) and will be live translated between English and French. Come and share a life-changing experience with an intercultural mix of participants and a pair of dynamic and international permaculture educators!
Course Objectives and Content
Earth Activist Training (EAT) is an intensive course combining theory with practical hands-on learning. Completion of the course earns participants a Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) – the foundation for further permaculture work and study and a prerequisite for the Diploma in Permaculture Design. Participants will learn Permaculture design principles & techniques. The course includes lectures, discussions, hands-on learning, slideshows, Earth-based rituals, and design projects. We will examine the underlying assumptions of the current culture of consumerism and economic globalisation, and encourage exploration of ways to contribute to the emergence of a culture of sustainability, compassion and equity. The PDC covers a broad range of subjects to provide a holistic overview of Permaculture systems and sustainable living. Some of the topics / themes that we cover are:
- Principles & Ethics of permaculture
- Ecological planning, mapping & design methods
- Organic food production and food security
- Climatic factors in design
- Soils: natural soil improvement
- Agroforestry & forest gardening
- Appropriate technologies & renewable energy systems
- Ecovillages & sustainable human settlements
- Nature connection practices and personal resilience
- Social permaculture
- Tools for effective collaboration in groups
- Communication skills and conflict transformation
- Bioremediation
- Garden design and planning
What Can I Do After This Course?
- Embark on new food growing practices
- Manage a school or community garden
- Design and plan a resilient, land-based project or community—from the water systems to the governance and decision-making systems
- Realise goals towards self-sufficiency
- Advocate strategically for policies that address climate change and environmental justice
- Find ways of dramatically reducing energy consumption
- Start a permaculture diploma program
- Volunteer internationally with permaculture programs worldwide
City dwellers have found that even with little or no land, Permaculture shows them how to work with their home to produce food, reduce energy needs, live more ecologically and in closer connection with their communities. Educators, farm advisers, international development workers, garden directors, builders, master gardeners, and landscape architects have all reported that what they’ve learned in this course has become a foundation for their work. Farmers, nursery owners, foresters and livestock farmers have all found that Permaculture design has multiplied their incomes, reduced their work, and improved the health of their stock.
This course is committed to creating a welcoming space for people who are/were exposed to any form of discrimination.
Bilingual English – French
The course will be translated live between the two languages. As well, Starhawk and Alfred speak basic French…just don’t mind their Californian accents!
Where
Grain&Sens is an ecovillage that was created in 2018 with the ambition of creating a multicultural and bilingual project where people can share spaces, equipment, land and knowledge, aiming at the preservation of natural resources. The ecovillage is managed by the association, Grain&Sens, which promotes actions and activities which care for the local environment and community and connect to a global context. Grain&Sens is based in the Lavenant estate, located at an altitude of 750m. It is cradled in lush greenery, surrounded by 20 hectares of forest and prairies. There are independent spaces for each family and inhabitant, and communal spaces to welcome groups and camps. Beautiful nature surrounds the inhabitants who have adopted a lifestyle with low environmental impact. The main activities and training courses happening on site focus on education for sustainable development. Training courses offered onsite bring people together from France and Europe to share knowledge and co-create.
Family-Friendly
Shelby Geitner, farmer and educator from Grain&Sens will be collaborating with Daniella Querol, artist, educator, and permaculturalist (fluent in English, German, Spanish and Catalan), to offer activities that allow children to observe and connect with nature with their heads, hearts and hands. The program will adapt to children and will be developed in parallel with the themes of the EAT around: + Exploratory adventures: of nature and elements: Earth, Fire, Water and Air, + Activities around Art, Nature and cooperative games + Sharing tools (sharing and gratitude circles) + links to oneself (Sit Spot and journaling) + Yoga and dance for children + English-language learning skills + cooking + gardening + an evening of camping all together.
Each day is punctuated with at least one practical time of Family Permaculture. There will be days dedicated to family sharing. During weekdays, activities will be offered to PDC kids and local kids alike, with the intention of offering a space for children to mix cultures, languages, and learn from each other.
Shelby Geitner manages Lavenant Gardens, a small-scale agroecological farming business at Lavenant. Shelby strives for creating garden spaces that are both productive and pedagogic. She also manages the English language learning Eco-Camps offered at Grain&Sens through the non-profit, The Wooden House. For more information on Shelby’s work with The Wooden House and Lavenant Gardens, visit the Grain&Sens website.
The all-inclusive cost for bringing a child (food, accommodation and activities during approximately 8 hours/day) is €400/child for the 14 days. If you are unable to pay this fee, please contact us HERE so we can look for a solution together.
The Facilitation Team
Starhawk
One of the foremost voices in Earth-based spirituality, Starhawk is an author, activist, and permaculture teacher and designer. Her 13 books include such beloved reads as The Spiral Dance, The Earth Path, and The Fifth Sacred Thing. Starhawk drew from 30 years of living collectively to write The Empowerment Manual, which is the basis for her social permaculture course, Empowering Collaborative Groups.
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Starhawk has been recognized by the Permaculture Institute of North America (PINA) as a leading figure in permaculture and has been awarded dual diplomas for excellence in education and permaculture site design. As a teacher of magical activism and permaculture education, Starhawk’s life work takes her across the globe. She currently lives part-time in San Francisco in a collective house with her partner and friends, and part-time in a little hut in the woods in Cazadero, California, where she practices permaculture in her extensive gardens and writes.
Alfred Decker
Alfred Decker (he/him) is an award-winning permaculture designer; the Education Coordinator of Permaculture For Refugees; a certified educator with the Permaculture Association of Britain; a leading voice in Social Permaculture; and one of Europe’s innovative permaculture educators. Alfred has been involved with social movements and permaculture projects across many borders. He is the director of the 12P Permaculture Design consultancy; was a co-founder of Permacultura Barcelona and the Spanish Permaculture Academy (Academia de Permacultura Íbera).
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After taking a “Permaculture Teacher Training” (PTT) course with Rosemary Morrow in 2011, he undertook a two year mentorship and later co-facilitated six courses as her assistant, ultimately earning a Diploma in Permaculture Education & Community Development in 2013 through the Blue Mountains Permaculture Institute (Australia). Committed to furthering the PTT course that Rosemary developed in over four decades of teaching experience around the world, Alfred facilitated over 20 PTT courses as lead facilitator and co-edited all three versions of the PTT Manual (free download of the third edition HERE). Rosemary has asked him to organise the PTT trainings in Europe, and he has also developed an online version of the course on the Permaculture Association of Britain’s online educational platform.
In 2024 Alfred joined the Global Council of Permaculture For Refugees. He is passionate about how permaculture can be useful to refugees and migrants, and how permaculture education can be designed for them as learners…and how they in turn can best share their valuable knowledge and experience with others.
He also works closely with Starhawk and her organisation Earth Activist Training as part of the EAT teaching team.
Alfred lives in the old town centre of Berga, Catalunya (Spanish Territory), and is available for educational activities, design work and consulting.
When
Begins:
August 1, 2025. The recommended time of arrival is between 3pm and 6pm. To arrive on time by bus the latest bus you could take is the 4.10pm bus leaving from Valence Ville station on Friday. The morning bus is also possible, and arriving the 31st is also possible but not ideal.
Ends:
August 14, 2025. For the departure on August 14th in the afternoon, the best bus to take leaves from 5.15pm from Boffres arriving at 6.20pm to Valence Ville station. If that is too late for your travel plan, the 12.30pm bus is also possible but it will be tight timing on the final morning.
2025 will be the eighth year that Starhawk and Alfred will be teaching together in Europe, having collaborated on 13 courses together.
Community
You will be part of an international community during this training. Previous participants testify to the value of learning and practicing in a supportive group and making global connections!
Food & Accommodation
Food
The food offered by Grain&Sens is delicious, colourful and vegetarian. Participants who would like to eat meat products are invited to bring their own, or to buy local options.
Accommodation
Shared rooms or family rooms in the two lodges of the Grain&Sens ecovillage is the recommended option. Camping tents and van are also possible at a lower cost. The costs for food and accommodation charged by the hosts are as follows:
For a stay of 13 days and nights…
• Accommodation: 300€ in shared (or family) rooms // 150€ on site camping
• Meal cost: 350€ full pension (recommended) // 260€ half pension
• For kids, all prices are 50% OFF
Fees
The course fees are separate from the Food & Accomodation costs that go to the hosts, Grain&Sens. EAT offers a sliding scale that encourages people with higher incomes to give a bit more towards the course fees. The scale for this certified training is between 440€ – 540€ per person. Those who can afford to pay more on the higher end of the scale will help those who can only pay less. The sliding scale recognises the differences in economic reality depending on what country a participant comes from, as well as their individual circumstances, so this is a practical way that people with more resources can act in solidarity. If you want to propose a different price based on your economic situation, please share with us on this application what you want to contribute and why you need support.
We also have some pay-what-you-can scholarships for people of color working in environmental and social justice movements. That is part of our way of supporting reparations and of bringing in more diversity to our permaculture movement. If you are a BIPOC or refugee/migrant and interested in one of these scholarships, please apply HERE. If anyone is interested in helping with Europe-focused fundraising for this course, please contact Alfred HERE.
Your fees include:
A life-changing learning experience
A PDC Certificate
Digital resources
A new generation of permaculture doers for you to join!
How to Arrive
• Exact address: 360 Chemin de Lavenant 07440 Boffres, FRANCE
• Train: the closest train station is VALENCE VILLE (recommended) or VALENCE TGV (easy connection to Valence Ville). You can then take the bus from there
• Bus: LINE 46 takes you from VALENCE VILLE train station to the village of Boffres.
• Carpooling: we will organise a shared document to plan carpooling options
• Shuttle: if necessary we will organise shuttles to pick up participants in Valence