Many people become permaculture teachers after experiencing the transformative effect of learning permaculture, especially after taking a PDC (Permaculture Design Certificate). 

Permaculture feels like applied common sense, so you feel empowered and want to reach more people with this knowledge and positively transform people’s lives and society.

Learning Pathways

After completing the permaculture design certificate you have several options for your next steps in becoming a teacher - and we recommend you do 3 things: 

1. Get all the resources needed to become a teacher by signing up for the Educators Membership. Get tailored support from the Education Lead to help you develop your own learning pathway. 

2. Join the Permaculture Community Hub as an Educator member and access the support, connections and monthly online gatherings

3. Become an apprentice Educator to start building your teaching experience. Contact one of our experienced educators who can offer apprenticeships.

Becoming an apprentice 

Begin to understand what’s needed to organise a permaculture course by becoming an apprentice. There are many elements to teaching, insurance, timetabling, course delivery, course culture, venues, training and finances amongst others - and by supporting a teacher with their course, you can learn about many aspects of teaching. You can also deliver sessions on another teacher's course, to start to practice and develop your teaching skills. 

  • To offer your skills and time as an apprentice you can use our noticeboard to let teachers know you are looking for teaching opportunities.  
  • You can use our Community Hub to ask educators who are running courses if you can get involved as an apprentice 
  • You can view specific courses in your area using the course listings page and check whether the teachers have listed that the course is open to apprentices.

If you decide you want to become a Certified Teacher, you need to teach on 5 PDC’s as an apprentice, as this provides evidence of your teaching experience.

The teachers you taught with can then act as referees for your application. 

 

Options for teaching and our recommendations

lady working on a design

Teaching the Intro to Permaculture

Requires that you have completed a PDC.
It’s best that you do this with an experienced educator, although it's not essential  - generally, you will have more opportunities to contribute at this level.

People learning in a group outside

Teaching the PDC

Recommended that you complete a teacher training course after your PDC, and before you contribute to a PDC.

Diploma accreditation

Teaching the Diploma in Applied Permaculture

Must complete the Diploma (typically a minimum 2 years) and then a diploma tutor training course.

People learning together

Using permaculture in your College or University course

This is dependent on your institution's requirements - we recommend taking a PDC, possibly completing the Diploma as a way to design your FE or HE level permaculture curriculum and learning activities, or possibly studying to master level in a related discipline and having at least a PGCE.

People learning together

Guest teaching on the online learning platform

Have taught to PDC level and are a certified teacher - we are particularly looking to work with teachers from marginalised backgrounds and will support you even if you are not certified.  

For all of the above options, we recommend you sign up as an educator member, which will give you access to the following benefits:

  • Support from your peers via the monthly continuous professional development meetings and community hub private channel 
  • Dedicated support from our education lead 
  • Access to our Teaching Resources folder to support the quality of your teaching 
  • The option to join the Certified Teachers Register 
  • Marketing support for reaching learners 

Join the Certified Teachers Register

You can learn more about the process for joining the certified teachers register here. The Certified Teachers Register enables you to provide Permaculture Association certificates for your courses. 
We recommend these teachers to students, in the hundreds of emails we get a year about which teacher and course to choose.

Our course listings page is the most popular page on our website, and certified teachers have a special logo next to their courses so that learners can find the right teacher for them.

Our certified teachers register is respected worldwide, with teachers from countries all over the world choosing to certify with us, as their students consistently want our certificates.

This is particularly important as we are moving towards accreditation with providers recognised for college and University courses. 
 

Teacher training course 

Use our course listings page to search for teacher training courses. You can study in-person with a range of highly experienced educators including Looby Macnamara and Chris Evans, and online with Rosemary Morrow and Alfred Decker and the Permaculture Education Institute. 
 

Becoming a Diploma tutor 

If you hold a diploma you can apply to become a diploma tutor. There are 3 levels to tutoring - Registration, Assessment and Senior. Training is usually run annually, often just before the Diploma Gathering so potentially you'll have the opportunity to have some tutorials observed and signed off at the event.