<div dir="ltr"><h2>Practical Information</h2>
<p><strong>What:</strong> A weekend to share our passion, knowledge, and skills for building healthy soils</p>
<p><strong>When: </strong>27 – 28th May 2017 (arrivals welcome Friday evening)</p>
<p><strong>Where: </strong>Brook End LAND Centre, Compton Dundon – near Street and Glastonbury in Somerset</p>
<p><strong>How to book your place: </strong>Please email <a href="mailto:eat@feedavalon.org.uk">eat@feedavalon.org.uk</a></p>
<p><strong>Cost: </strong>The Gathering is a not-for-profit event with
financial support to enable access and participation. Contributions are
sliding scale between £25 – £125 for the weekend including meals and
camping. For folks who cannot afford the lowest rate, please let us know
and you can be allocated one of the free places. For individuals coming
from Universities, Businesses or other Professional Organisations, we
hope you can pay the top rate. All costs will be transparent and we will
invest any surplus generated at the event for a starter fund for
SoilHack related initiatives.</p>
<h2>About SoilHack</h2>
<p>SoilHack was set up to provide a space for people to collaborate in
sharing information to help us both better understand our soils and
improve their health, having been inspired by the DIY spirit of the
FarmHack movement. More details here: <a href="http://farmhack.org/wiki/soilhack-wiki" target="_blank">http://farmhack.org/wiki/soilhack-wiki</a></p>
<p>Over the past few years we’ve been seeing an increasing number of
people sharing stories of how they’ve transformed their soils (and in
some cases workloads) through applying novel methods: no-dig, cover
cropping, biochar, agroforestry, etc etc. This struck us as significant,
given the current horrific rates of soil depletion, and the
game-changing role that soil carbon could play in regenerating the
biosphere.</p>
<p>The challenge, especially for people who are full-time producers, is
to somehow get a toehold on the growing body of soil research which
helps one understand why these practices work, as well as getting a
sense of how they’d be relevant in our own situation. Our response to
this has been to try to create a self-organising network for sharing
knowledge.</p>
<p>Up until now we’ve done this through collating good resources on our
wiki, running a soil events email list and a Twitter account, and
presenting at Farm Hack events. In truth, SoilHack has yet to develop in
the direction that we’d hoped it might, which is to harness the
enormous potential of peer-to-peer learning and skill-sharing. With this
gathering, that’s about to change!</p>
<p>We’re inviting you to contribute your experience, insight, and
curiosity to this effort so that we can begin to rapidly grow our
collective intelligence, and in turn, all become its benefactors. This
knowledge needs spreading and putting into action fast.</p>
<h2>About the Gathering</h2>
<p>We will be all learners at the gathering. It is a DIY event and
everyone will need to play a role in helping the gathering run smoothly.</p>
<p>We are asking people to email us in advance with offers of workshops.
We expect sessions to be participatory, science and evidence-based, and
practical where possible. We can support you with designing a workshop
if this is new to you.</p>
<p>There will also be space on the programme for self-organised
workshops and sessions that arise as needed and relevant over the
weekend.</p>
<p>As well as practical workshops, there will be time set aside for
discussions and strategy sessions on how to build the SoilHack Movement.</p>
<p><strong>How to offer a workshop</strong></p>
<p>Please make sure you have emailed <a href="mailto:eat@feedavalon.org.uk">eat@feedavalon.org.uk</a> to book your place at the Gathering.</p>
<p>Please email your workshop idea to <a href="mailto:soilhack@openmailbox.org">soilhack@openmailbox.org</a></p>
<p>Please tell us:</p>
<ul><li>A bit about yourself & interest in SoilHack</li><li>A synopsis of your workshop</li><li>What space and equipment you might need e.g. projector</li><li>If there is a maximum number of people for the activity</li><li>Any support you need</li></ul>
<p>Please note no one is paid for giving workshops at the Gathering. All
of us contribute. If you need financial support to participate, please
let us know when booking.</p><h2>Please share in your networks!<br></h2><p></p><p>Full details: <a href="http://www.feedavalon.org.uk/soilhack2017/">http://www.feedavalon.org.uk/soilhack2017/</a></p><p>Fedbook Event page: <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/1835948839977901/">https://www.facebook.com/events/1835948839977901/</a><br></p><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><span title="qreply">--<br></span><i>In order to change an existing paradigm you do not struggle to try and change the problematic model /</i>
<i>You create a new model and make the old one obsolete /</i>
<i>That, in essence, is the higher service to which we are all being called. //</i> Buckminster Fuller<span></span></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>
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