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Transition Culture

An Evolving Exploration into the Head, Heart and Hands of Energy Descent

Monthly archive for May 2011

Showing results 11 - 15 of 20 for the month of May, 2011.


13 May 2011

…and while we’re on the subject: the 350 Garden Challenge

Last year, residents of Sonoma County, California planted over 600 gardens in a single weekend. This year, Transition US and 350.org are helping their idea go national, with the 350 Home and Garden Challenge on May 14th and 15th. Though plenty of gardens are planned, participants will also be transforming homes and landscapes of all kinds—by also insulating homes, installing greywater systems, or planting native, drought-resistant plants—and hosting classes, potlucks, and neighbourhood swaps to build community.  What a great initiative… perhaps we should spread it beyond the US next year?  Here’s a lovely short film about it…

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13 May 2011

Transition Town Tufnell Park’s ‘Big Dig’

Here’s a lovely short film from London about a back garden make-over organised by Transition Town Tufnell Park…

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11 May 2011

Ingredients of Transition: Education for Transition

Members of Transition Edinburgh University do something interesting in some woods somewhere to celebrate 10:10:10...

Here is the very final additional ingredient for ‘The Transition Companion’.  It is still in draft form, so I’d really appreciate your thoughts, comments, or interesting case studies of things your initiative is up to…  Thanks.  My thanks to Isabel Carlisle for her input with this ingredient…

How can education, at all levels, best contribute to the Transition process, building resilient individuals, resilient communities and resilient institutions?

“Sustainability is about the terms and conditions of human survival, and yet we still educate at all levels as if no such crisis existed”.

David Orr.

The future that young people and those in further education are currently being educated for is not the future that is, in reality, approaching.  The failure of government, and of much of the education system , to put resilience and sustainability central to their planning and teaching means that a whole generation is being prepared for business as usual while deep down most young people, and their teachers, know that the reality will be very different.  This is a woeful neglect of duty.

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11 May 2011

Why we love Transition Training

I thought I would take the opportunity this morning to rave enthusiastically about Transition training.  A few years ago Naresh Giangrande and Sophy Banks designed Transition Training as a two-day total immersion in the first stages of this evolving process.  Since the first course in Totnes in October 2007, 106 training courses worldwide have been organised by Transition Training, with local organisers, and presented by members of a dedicated team of 16 UK trainers to over 2,500 participants.  Courses have been run throughout the UK, as well as in Eire, Sweden, Brazil, Portugal, Italy, Germany and Flanders. Dozens more are being organised and run by local organizing hubs in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, parts of South America, and Asia, led by a team of multilingual trainers.  Here is a recently made short film about it, the first of three I want to share with you:

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10 May 2011

Does engagement with Transition make people happier and healthier?

Does engaging in Transition lead to people being healthier and happier?  This is a question that has often been speculated on, and one that Janet Richardson, Professor of Health Service Research, Faculty of Health of the University of Plymouth has explored before, but as part of the Transition Together and Transition Streets initiatives happening in Totnes, she has just produced ‘Assessing the potential health impacts of a Transition town initiative: a health impact assessment of Totnes Transition Together and Transition Streets: a short report prepared for Transition Town Totnes, May 2011′, the first piece of research I know of that looks at this question.  It is very short, and largely speculative, but it opens the door for more detailed study of this most fascinating of areas.

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