I’ve decided to take the leap and enroll in the PDC 2.0. That’s Geoff Lawton’s current online Permaculture Design Course. The permaculture course starts today, and is exactly what I want to help me plan fixes for the two acres of flood plain that have completely lost all topsoil and vegetation at Dove Ranch.
It was a hard decision to take the class, despite the years I’ve wanted to. Normally, his classes are taught in-person, in Australia and take weeks or months. For obvious reasons, I can’t quit my job, drop all family responsibilities and fly to Australia, even to learn from one of my permaculture heroes. However, I can do online courses.
First, I had to come up with the $1000 for the course. That took a lot of careful self-examination of my finances and corner-cutting. I made a list of things I’ve been paying for that I could (somewhat painfully, in some cases) live without. I only needed to include one item that family bulked at, and I pointed out that if they really felt it was necessary to keep, they were welcome to pay for it.
Second, time is a real factor with this course. Geoff Lawton has said we’ll have six months instead of the regular three months to complete the course material, but even with the slower pace, I’m buried. I work a day job, and have hours of work associated with studying for my day job, too. Also, I also have a business I’m trying to get off the ground, and that requires as much free time as I can spare. In addition to that, I have yard work, work at Dove Ranch, family/children, and my wife has “requested” that I finish a bedroom in my unfinished basement before my daughter’s return from Japan.
This all adds up, but taking this PDC is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Despite my other time constraints, I really need to make this work. So I decided to go for it and figure out the time issues as I go.
Wish me luck!
So how was the course? Would you recommend it to someone who has already taken an 8-week pdc and read Mollison’s Designers Manual cover to cover?
It looks like a neat format, but maybe the 2.0 is a bit misleading since it still seems like a PDC for newbies. What I’m after is a PDC for experts.
I think that if you’ve read the manual and taken a PDC, this will be mostly repeat information. However, Geoff Lawton has wonderful insights, so if you want a refresher, this course would be worth it just for the Q&A videos.