Empowering Youth Through Participatory Innovation

IN.PACT Project Gaia Education Europe Union

💡 What does it take to empower youth as changemakers in their communities?
Learn how the IN.PACT project is equipping young people with participatory skills to drive social inclusion and resilience across Europe.

In November, Gaia Education and its partners officially launched the IN.PACT project—a two-year Erasmus+ initiative aimed at equipping young people and youth workers with participatory skills to foster inclusion and resilience. The kickoff meeting brought together four organizations fro…

Read more…

What is "Systems Thinking"?

Systems Thinking _blog banner
Felicia Chavez, instructor of Gaia Education's Systems Thinking for Real-World Change course, introduces us to a framework for 'thinking about systems thinking.' This framework highlights three key perspectives that define the challenging and often surprising world of systems thinking.

Read more…

🌀Creating Sustainable Designs with a Whole-Systems Approach

fractal-429033_1280

Image from Pixabay MysticArtDesign


To design sustainably, we must recognise the interconnectedness of both challenges and solutions. This is where a whole-systems approach comes in—it takes a comprehensive look at all elements of a system and their interactions to create efficient, sustainable outcomes.


What is a System?

A system is best described as:

“a collection of subjects or elements that have a relationship among themselves.”
These relationships form patter…

Read more…

How food connects us to Earth 🍌 Conscious Food Systems Alliance Case studies

Case_study

Conscious Food Systems Alliance has put together a collection of case studies that showcase exemplary practises in conscious and regenerative food systems. And we at Gaia Education are so proud to be a part of it!

🍉Food connects us fundamentally with the Earth and with one another and the Conscious Food systems alliance wants to help people connect to nature again through eating and the food that sustains us. This in return can help us alleviate and solve dysfunctional food systems; hunger, obe…

Read more…

What is regenerative literacy?

tree-stump-7455677_1280

Image from Anglopix


When you have the understanding and the words to describe something, you can become more engaged with it. Eco- or regenerative literacy is integral in helping us understand our environment while developing intrinsic regenerative values and the skills needed to maintain in harmony with nature. 

It goes beyond sustainability by focusing on restoring, renewing, and enhancing the natural environment, human communities, and their interactions with one another. Imagine if our f…

Read more…

What happens when you shift the power dynamics of pedagogy?

WhatsApp Image 2024-05-10 at 18.32.35

This text is adapted from a chapter called "Pedagogy" written by Jonathan Dawson from the book Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary created by Alberto Acosta. 


Pedagogy: from the middle French (16th century), from Latin paedagogia, ‘education, attendance on boys’, from paidagogos ‘teacher’.

Challenging Assumptions in Education

Our current educational systems have many dominating core assumptions that are so deeply entrenched in us that we are rarely even aware of their existence. The a…

Read more…

Latest from Global sustainable development with Scottish International Alliance

image4

Last week, Gaia Education had the opportunity to attend the Scottish International Development Alliance’s annual conference, held at Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh. This significant event brought together a diverse group of NGOs, global development experts, and healthcare professionals to explore collaborative strategies for creating a more equitable and sustainable world for future generations.

The conference buzzed with energy as NGOs, global development experts, and healthcare professionals conv…

Read more…

Connecting and Co-Creating: Reflections from the GEN Europe Ecovillage Gathering at Ängsbacka

20240819_122931

GEN Europe’s Ecovillage Gathering was held at Ängsbacka in Sweden this year, from 20-25 August. Taisa, Macaco, Peter, and Sally had the pleasure of representing Gaia Education at this Community of Communities.

We connected with longterm friends, colleagues and partners, absorbed the latest innovations in thought, presencing and action in the ecovillage and regenerative world, co-envisioned new projects, and got updated on all the news from around the European movement and beyond. It is a vital ev…

Read more…

Cultivating an education as if people and planet mattered

boy-1846236_1280

Image from Pixabay Pexels

'The volume of education has increased and continues to increase, yet so do pollution, exhaustion of resources, and the dangers of ecological catastrophe. If still more education is to save us, it would have to be education of a different kind. '

-EF Schumacher


It is all too easy to despair in the face of the inertia in our various systems that stifles the kind of changes that we so urgently need to respond to the crises facing us. This is true not least in the fie…

Read more…