With Your Support, Good Things Happened at The Eco-Institute in 2020….
Lessons in Adaptive Community Resilience
“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.”
To say the least, 2020 was a challenging year that required resilience, grit, and adaptability of our whole community. And while we were forced to postpone or cancel many programs, we found that this year was as good a year as any to practice what we preach: skills and systems for community resilience, dedicated to social & ecological healing.
In many ways 2020 challenged us all to dig deeper, help one another, and to reassess our commitments. The end of 2020 finds us invigorated with a stronger sense of purpose, resilience, and of what we stand for.
One highlight of 2020 for many people and organizations was the understanding that we are all interconnected, and that we do not exist outside of the political, economic and social systems in place, nor do we exist apart from the pain inflicted upon members of our society and on other-than-human beings of our beloved Earth Community.
This year required a leveling up of commitment to be responsive, relevant and brave in the face of a world demanding that we do better, and do it now. While our programming was based on our core values, which have not changed, it also was responsive to the reality we lived through together in 2020: the pandemic, the election, and the rise to global awareness of extreme exploitation and violence against BIPOC in our country.
Some might say that 2020 was a bust. Our view is that 2020 busted up a lot of false pretenses, assumptions, blind spots and security blankets. 2020 asked us to listen up and show up. 2020 asked us, what do you stand for, and what are you going to do about it? Here are some of our responses:
The Yome Village was repurposed to provide shelter-in-place housing during the first 3 months of the pandemic.
We formalized 3-tiered pricing for program accessibility
Enormous interest and support in our Learning Gardens led us to DOUBLE the capacity of the Garden Cooperative program, build a new Harvest Shed, feed 50 families per season and still donate extra produce!
We installed 2 new beehives and 10kW of new solar panels
We built a Garden Harvest Shed and provided extra fresh produce to Food Not Bombs, who distributed to community members in need
We committed to an ongoing process of listening and evolving to become a more accessible and racially inclusive community
Grow-Your-Own Home Yoga Practice became our first entirely online offering, helping folks stay strong and well during stay-at-home protocols
Rising Earth immersion
Thanks to your contributions, we raised over $60,000 in scholarship funds for the Rising Earth Immersion, which allowed 63% of all participants to receive financial assistance. As part of our larger Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Access strategy we introduced a new category of Equity Scholarships which prioritize BIPOC applicants and contributed to building two of the most diverse cohorts to date!
We developed a Core Curriculum for Rising Earth that centered anti-oppression education within transformative permaculture
Rising Earth Immersion continued to appeal to young adults dedicated to social & ecological healing who are seeking meaningful, alternative, experiential education. Thanks to stringent quarantine and testing procedures, the two 2020 residential immersions were fully covid-free. Among gap year counselors and other program providers, Rising Earth was praised as a model program for covid-safe protocols and curricular engagement of the challenges of our times.
We collaborated with Democracy NC in protecting the vote at local polling sites
We connected every immersion program participant with their own mentor from among the most thoughtful and inspiring local folks we know
We collaborated with Paperhand Puppet Intervention, among other local art-ivists, in offering the first thematic Arts & Activism immersion