Community Biology Class, Wiltshire

As many of you know, I have been holding a Community Biology Class for the past six months, in Lacock, Wiltshire. It has been an amazing experience.

We spent the first 6 weeks studying the relationships between Salmon, the Bears and the Forests in the North West Pacific. We then spent 6 weeks studying the Great Ocean Conveyor, learning about oceans, currents, and the different aquatic ecosystems, from all around the world. We had a live broadcast from the Archelon Turtle Rescue Centre in Greece. And our current 6 week cycle is about the British Atlantic Rainforest. We are talking about the regeneration of the British forest flora after the Younger Dryas. It has been an amazing experience. And the kids love it.

My next class was to be on the South Western Desert, ethnobotany, the Indigenous peoples, and their relationship with the land, in Mexico, in Arizona, and in Nevada. Moving from Rainforest to Desert. One sacred land to another.

Except that this morning I learned that there is no more money, and so my class has been cut.

I know perfectly well in the UK that there are children who benefit from an education costing nearly £40,000 a year. The country is awash with money. And yet there are places, and parents, who do not have this kind of finance. My course costs £570 for a series of six lessons.

So here is a thing. Is there anyone out there who would graciously fund my class for the next six weeks?

I want to teach about the desert, but I also intend to teach about Nevada, and about the Lithium mine that is now destroying the Sacred lands of the PeeheeMuhuh, the Thacker Pass. Max Wilbert, who has been defending those lands with the Community of the Reno Sparks Indian Colony, has shared some of his experiences with me of that land. I have listened to the Reno-Sparks Community sharing about the land. And sharing about how the land is sacred is part of this work. I want to teach this class. I hold a vision that we can teach this class.

I have written often about what is happening in Britain. This is just another part of it. Somehow, we must resist, and make the essential possible for our children and our communities.

When I see how engaged these kids are in the work we are doing, they are amazing. They are the stewards of the land, to come. I realise my role in this is to hold that vision open for them, that we can all become stewards of the land. We can care about the land. Love the land. Look after the land. Support the Peoples of the Land.

If any amongst you can contribute, I thank you from my heart. I would like to write to my course leader on Monday and say, hey, our course is going ahead. How? Because some amazing people have stepped up, stepped in, and we have raised what is necessary.

Please help us. It is not right that the austerity sweeping Britain stops these kids from receiving an education which is land-based, and holds the land sacred.

Respectfully, and with my thanks.

Pete Jeffs