In the ‘Present Tense’ series of talks at Brockwood Park School, Stef Kling explains how the financial crises has come about and why our present system can not work. He offers radical and convincing suggestions of what what we can do to create a sustainable financial system.
Archive for the 'School Events' Category
Rob Hopkins gives an inspiring talk in our Present Tense lecture series:
He is co-founder of Transition Town Totnes and Transition Network. This grew out of many years experience in education, teaching permaculture and natural building. Further, Rob Hopkins also set up the first two-year full-time permaculture course in the world, at Kinsale Further Education College in Ireland, as well as co-ordinated the first eco-village development in Ireland to be granted planning permission.
He is also the author of “The Transition Companion: making your community more resilient in uncertain times”, and previously wrote the best-selling “Transition Handbook”. He blogs at www.transitionculture.org, tweets as robintransition, speaks widely on Transition and peak oil, has won various awards, and lives in Devon where he raises both children and vegetables.
Hip-hop and raku ceramics, songwriting and Japanese cooking. What is the link? Every year for one week Brockwood’s normal routine grinds to a halt and in its place we have one week’s exposure and excitement with a host of skills. These Winter Workshops provided a learning opportunity for everybody involved and showcased that power Brockwood has of bringing together fascinating people from all corners of the world. Each workshop showcased a unique skill by talented individuals who taught precision techniques to first-time novices in the form of students, mature students and staff at Brockwood Park School. The most obvious example of this is Alan Baxter’s ceramics workshop, dealing with raku firing techniques. This had participants cooking pottery pieces, often in six foot flames raging into the thousands of degrees, with a sure and deft touch. “The beauty of the work is in the unexpected imperfections that the fire gives it,” say Jorge (Spain) and Max (Belgium), two participants in Alan’s workshop.
Continue reading ‘Winter Workshops (formerly known as the Autumn Week Workshops)’
In the ‘Present Tense’ series, Alumnus Frode Steen talks about his time at Brockwood Park School, and how important it was for his development. His talk was entitled “Making a career in academia without giving up your soul.” It took place Saturday 3rd of March 2012:
“Brockwood is sometimes accused of being excessively idealistic and impractical, failing to prepare students for the harsh realities of life. Frode will talk about how his background at Brockwood provided the impulse for his work in graduate school, helped him get through hard times, and laid the foundations for his interdisciplinary research.”
Frode was a student at Brockwood in the late ’70s and early ’80s, and is a trustee of the Krishnamurti Foundation of America. He is a professor of Communication Studies at UCLA in California, and an associate of the Mind & Society Initiative at Azim Premji University in Bangalore.
We will have a Brockwood exhibit in Paris at http://www.salon-vivreautrement.com.
Staff Eva and Yannick, together with mature student Amel will be there, happy to talk with you about the school and answer in person any questions you might have. We’ll be on stand E33 and are excited to see as many of you as possible.
We have free tickets for you for the fair. If you want some let us know as soon as you can so we can post them to you. Send us your details (name, postal address and number of tickets) via the contact page on the school website.
Once or twice during the school year we hold a “Food Festival”, in which groups of students and staff concoct dishes from their national regions to share with the whole school. This year our first food festival took place early, in the second week of school, allowing everyone to get to know one another better by cooking together. All staff’s kitchens were utilized, while the whole organization side of the event was done by students. It was an overwhelming success as you can see below from the pictures and video.
Student and staff cooking together in the main kitchen.
Continue reading ‘International Vegetarian Food Festival’
Every year we invite all parents to come to Brockwood for a whole weekend and participate in everything that we do and more. In the past few years the event has become more and more popular and this year it was the most attended one to date: indeed over 70 parents joined us for three days! If you think the dining hall tends to be a little crowded these days, just imagine it with seventy more bodies! That said we ended up being very lucky with the weather and many naturally chose to eat on the beautiful south lawn.
Continue reading ’2011 Brockwood Parents’ Weekend, March 25th-27th’
Former staff member, Phil Quinn is an ecology consultant. He is a regular guest at the Krishnamurti Centre and on several occasions has given guided tours of the Brockwood grounds to examine the local flora and fauna.
From January 5th to the 11th, while students are still on their winter break, the staff are on a collegiality-building retreat at Yewfield, a vegetarian B&B run by former Brockwood staff members, situated in the north of England in the Lake District. There we are seriously studying K’s teaching daily as well as sitting together silently, having dialogues about the intentions of the school, cooking together, and going on walks in the beautiful nature around. Enjoy below some of the pictures taken on the Jan. 6th hike up to “Black Crag”.
A white coat of light snow has replaced the green of the lawns…
Here is a video of it all taken by Duncan, of the Krishnamurti Foundation, as he wandered around the grounds of Brockwood Park shortly after the second snowfall of the season:
