Introduction by Marti

GEN EDE Course News

Auroville is running its first GEN-sponsored EDE (Ecovillage Design Education) programme. We have a wonderful group of participants interested in creating sustainable communities from India, Thailand, Costa Rica, Holland, the USA, Portugal, and Senegal. We have given a few scholarships to Aurovilians, as well. Tlaloc is coordinating, Manjot is assisting, and Marti is helping to facilitate. About 30 people from Auroville and abroad are presenting their experiences in the fields of worldview, social action, economics, and the environment.

I (Marti) have been working for the past 8 years with an international team of educators (including Daniel Greenberg from the Living Routes programme and many others) to create a communities design curriculum. Our programme is part of a collaborative effort with UNESCO and the United Nations (UNITAR) as part of the UN Decade for Education.

Recently we have run programmes in Sao Paulo, Brazil for municipal leaders, in Mexico for grass roots permaculture designers, in Lotan, Isreal with a focus on environmental and cultural collaboration and peace-making between Isreal and Palestine, in Findhorn, Scotland with a Southeast Asian link, in the community of Tamara in Portugal, in Zegg and Seiben Linden in Germany and in Ithaca, New York. In the future, programmes will be run in Woningsit Buddhist Ashram in Thailand, in Crystal Waters, Australia and in Gaia Argentina, just to name a few. Some of these programmes have university affiliations and others link to open university courses.

The EDE International Curriculum team is presently working on 5 resource manuals that we will make accessible and freely downloadable on the web. Green Books will publish the hardback books in England for world distribution and these books will have useful and inspiring material. Two of the books are near completion. So after Harry Potter…

Just as a reminder, the GEN is a federation of nearly 15,000 communities worldwide, urban and rural, dedicated to sustainable plus living. The GEN website is: ecovillages.org

I am on the GEN and EDE international boards. If you would like more information about how to participate on the international level, please let me know. Tlaloc and Manjot are also helping us coordinate the GEN in Auroville.

Let’s hear from you.

Best wishes,

Marti

marti@auroville.org.in