The start of January marked the beginning of something very exciting in my neck of the woods: a brand new full year diploma in Permaculture Design and Resilient Ecosystems. This program at Pacific Rim College in Victoria BC Canada is a perfect and greatly needed addition to the ecosystem of permaculture offerings at schools in the Pacific Northwest. While it has all the elements of a regular permaculture design course (PDC) – and students do receive a design certificate – what I especially love about this program is its unique focus on community project management and business skills. I think it’s fair to say that most students take a PDC in hopes of building skills and knowledge to undertake their own projects and initiatives – whether that’s designing their own property, creating a community permaculture garden, working in the field of sustainability, or maybe even starting their own business. What’s common to all these things is the need for skills in project management, leadership and interpersonal dynamics, and communications. And while a lot of short PDCs focus on more technical subjects like site analysis, mapping, soils and the like, many folks would agree that this natural systems part is the “easy stuff”…
