Educator Member Teachers who have successfully applied and registered on our certified teachers register (CTR) can give out our permaculture design certificates.
View list of teachers on the Register
This logo will appear next to a teachers course listing,
if the teacher is CTR registered with us.
Certifying Teachers Register guidelines
Permaculture is all about taking responsibility and as teachers we need to ensure the best experience for learners and our co-teachers.
Therefore these guidelines outline the Certifying Teachers Register (CTR) recommendations for educators that have been approved to issue Permaculture Association (PAB's) certificates for the Permaculture Design Course (PDC).
They were created by the Education Working Group (EWG), a voluntary and independent working group whose aim is to improve the quality of permaculture education. If you are keen to teach Permaculture but as yet are not able to fulfil the CTR criteria, you are of course able to do so.
In fact we encourage you to design and teach ‘Introduction to Permaculture’ courses and other smaller scale workshops. You could also apprentice or offer modules of the core curriculum, on PDC’s teaching alongside Educator members already on the CTR. Building your experience like this can be a great way to check that you enjoy teaching, receive feedback from students and contribute towards the APEL (Accreditation of prior experiential learning) criteria for the CTR.
Becoming an Educator member means access to resources and a diverse community to support you on your Permaculture Educator journey. Those on the diploma can choose a 'top up' approach and pay the remainder to join the edu membership and certified teachers register. Once an educator member, you can join the educators portal, read the teachers handbook for free, access the educators private space on the community hub where we post the most recent consultancy jobs and create strong apprenticeship opportunities.
What is the Certifying Teachers Register?
This is a list of our current CTR members. The CTR is an international list of teachers who are able to certify their PDCs using the PAB official PDC certificate. The list is overseen by the Education Working Group (EWG), and used to respond to requests for PDC certificates issued by the Association.
The CTR teachers are independent teachers, outside of the Permaculture Association, and not employed by the Permaculture Association. Our policy ensures that those on the register, i.e. those giving out our certificates are suitably qualified to teach and are able to deliver the required content to an agreed standard.
These CTR guidelines are to support our certified educators to teach responsibly, and can also be used by students to ensure the course they are attending matches their needs. Expectations and guidelines for students on certified courses can be found here.
Application process and requirements:
Please read all of this page and use the links at the end
- You must be an educator member to join and remain on the CTR.
- We need to be confident that you have sufficient teaching and permaculture skills.
- You must have 2 years experience in practising permaculture, since your PDC.
- We require all certified teachers to have taught at least 1 course which covers the core learning modules from our PAB core curriculum, and to provide additional evidence, if this isn't already covered by your evidence submission.
- You must send your teaching timetable which corresponds to your core curriculum checklist (below).
If you do not meet these requirements - please contact [email protected]
You can demonstrate your permaculture skills through meeting at least 1 of these points:
- Have a Permaculture Diploma from a Diploma system recognised by the Permaculture Association Diploma Working Group
- Taking the Certificate in Applied Permaculture Design (CAPD) -an assessed 2 design Foundation to the Diploma, with additional referenced (CTR teacher or assessing tutor) 2 years permaculture experience -ie running a permaculture project, teaching alongside a teacher etc..
- You are responsible for the delivery of a LAND or iLAND centre -send documentation of your role
- You are responsible for a similar substantive and public facing permaculture project or initiative with sufficient documentation for over 2 years
- If you have faced barriers that have made it difficult to go through the Diploma process or develop a local project, you can still apply by emailing [email protected] and letting us know more about your permaculture skills, experience and knowledge.
You can demonstrate your teaching experience through meeting at least 1 of these points:
- Being a teacher in formal education - in a primary or secondary school, college or university
- Have an adult education teaching qualification such as Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector Level 3 (PTLLS), Award In Education and Training Level 3 (AET) or similar.
- Have a teaching qualification from a similar discipline, e.g. Forest Schools training or have taught within a suitable established network (e.g. home schooling) and can provide a reference
- Have attended a permaculture teacher training course or Training of Teachers (TOT) AND have experience in delivering introductory or PDC courses and workshops (APEL route,)or have been a diploma tutor for 2 years.
- Or have taught at some level (including apprenticeships) on at least three PDCs and can provide a reference from the certified teacher you have been working with (Accreditation of prior experiential learning -APEL route)
To stay on the CTR, teachers need to:
- Remain as an educator member of the Permaculture Association
- At suitable intervals or before creating an online course, fill out and submit the most recent PDC Core Curriculum Checklist in respect of their PDC's timetabled content
- Are expected to submit an annual teaching health check form, on their CPD
- Must provide GDPR proficient details of all students (including contact details) through this downloadable spreadsheet, who take a PDC. Details of the benefits of membership can be provided to your students here.
- All teachers must provide feedback forms to their learners, which will be reviewed in the annual health check.
- You must continue to fulfil the below requirements, as applicable:
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Have completed risk assessments of the teaching environment in relation to the course participant needs, including considering mental health first aid (or have 1 MH first aid trained team member on site, or have experience / training in supporting people through challenging and emotional experiences.)
Free courses are available on coursera and future learn.
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Have an up to date Health & Safety Policy in place
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Have 1 first aid trained team member on site.
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Have an up to date and appropriate safeguarding certificate . This is obligatory if working with children or vulnerable people.
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If providing food within the course, at least one member of staff needs to have a food hygiene certificate, and the food should be ethically considered. (EHO compliancy requirements in the UK)
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Barriers to participation - Treat all learners equitably and according to need regardless of age, sex, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, chronic illness/disability, or sexual orientation. Be clear about any limitations to accessibility.
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Respect local policies and procedures where appropriate.
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Have gathered voluntary and confidential information about their course participants relating to health conditions, accessibility needs and/ or their emotional wellbeing and according to GDPR.think this should be obligatory
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Personal assistants should be offered free spaces in order to help a person that may have a barrier to participation, though they are encouraged to pay for their own food
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To partake in continuous professional development (CPD) to ensure current and up to date information is shared, and attend Permaculture Teacher Training as often as is practicable. Please see the course listings page, and search for ‘Teacher Training’ .
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That the certified teacher needs to be present for the majority of the course.
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The lead educator should seek agreement & establish expectations and procedures on the first day of the course.
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How to apply?
Please complete 2 forms below:
1. the application form (with certified referee) - view only, download to your computer and complete
2. the teacher's core curriculum checklist - view only, download to your computer and complete
3. PLUS, send a copy of your PDC timetable to [email protected]. We will use this to verify your core curriculum checklist.
If you are teaching online, or moving to teach online after joining through your face to face timetable - you must send a new online teaching core curriculum checklist and timetable for your online course.
Certification
You can order your certificates here.
For online courses- you must use order the online PDC certificates.