By now, in this journey into 'From What If to What Next', it is clear that one of the key things in our world in 2021 that needs reimagining is our education system. In this episode, we explore how it might be if at the heart of that reimagining were permaculture principles. How would the underpinning of the National Curriculum with permaculture principles affect both what is taught, and how it is taught? Imagine a generation leaving school skilled in a diversity of practical sustainability skills, as well as being instinctive systems thinkers. After you've heard this conversation, anything less just won't do.   This wonderful conversation is only possible thanks to my two wonderful guests. Lusi Alderslowe is the author of 'Earth Care, People Care and Fair Share in Education: The Children in Permaculture Manual' and has been engaging children in permaculture in formal, non-formal and informal settings around Scotland since 2005. She's a mother of two, a Forest School Leader, a human ecologist and co-founder and coordinator of the Children in Permaculture project for the Permaculture Association and Gatehouse School. A certified Children in Permaculture trainer, she teaches online courses in Engaging Children in Permaculture with students from Australia to Austria, Kenya to Costa Rica.   From 2013-2018, Matt Willer was a full time humanities teacher at Reepham High School & College. It was during this time at this school that Matt decided to attempt to create a school allotment to inspire his students. After five years of non-stop work, and with the help of many amazing people, 'The Allotment Project' became a nationally recognised and celebrated secondary school allotment which subsequently won multiple awards.   In 2019, Matt left full-time teaching to set up The Papillon Project, which is now a registered charity. The 'Allotment Project' at Reepham High School & College, in many respects, was the 'accidental pilot' project that inspired Matt to create 'The Papillon Project' so he, and others, can help other secondary schools and colleges in Norfolk to also inspire children and young people to lead more sustainable lives too.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

Our far-reaching conversation, which could have gone on for hours, explores our relationship with land, and how a reimagining of that could unlock so much. My thanks to both of my guests for their generosity and wisdom.   Josina Calliste is a health professional, community organiser, and one of the co-founders of Land in Our Names (LION), a black-led collective addressing land inequalities affecting black people and people of colour's ability to farm and grow food in Britain.   Chris Smaje is author of the book 'A Small Farm Future' and the brilliant blog of the same name.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

Of all the 17 episodes of this podcast so far, this is the one that I had to go off somewhere quiet afterwards for a while to digest. It is a very powerful and fascinating discussion. My two guests are extraordinary, and I feel so blessed that they could make the time to join me in this wonderful What If exploration.   Sherri Mitchell (Weh’na Ha’mu’ Kwasset (She Who Brings the Light)) is an attorney, an activist, an advisor, a speaker and so so so much more, including author of ‘Sacred Instructions: indigenous wisdom for living spirit-based change’. She was born and raised on the Penobscot Indian Reservation.   Tyson Yunkaporta is an academic, an arts critic, and a researcher who belongs to the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland. He carves traditional tools and weapons and also works as a senior lecturer in Indigenous Knowledges at Deakin University in Melbourne. His recent book, Sand Talk: how indigenous thinking can save the world, is deeply wonderful and I am very much enjoying it right now.   Our discussion focused around the question ‘what if indigenous wisdom could save the world?’, and I hope it blows your mind as much as it did mine. I would recommend taking some time after you’ve listened to it to go for a walk and digest it. It worked for me.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

Play is a devalued aspect of both childhood and adulthood which has been declining now for decades, and its decline has had many knock-on effects across society. What would it be like if we decided to give it a huge boost, to create the ideal conditions for a re-emergence of play across education, economics, planning, and so much more? What might that look like?   I am joined in this episode by two of the most amazing guests to dive deep into this act of imagining. Ash Perrin is the founder and CEO of The Flying Seagull Project, a UK-based charity that works around the world to bring happiness to children who are marginalised or suffering. His small, highly-skilled team of around twenty professional entertainers use music, arts, dance and clowning to spread smiles to more than 140,000 children in hospitals, orphanages and refugee camps around the world. His TEDx talk from last year is a must-watch. Ben Tawil is a play consultant and researcher. Working together with his colleague Mike Barclay as Ludicology, they have over 40 years’ experience of working with and on behalf of playing children. Their work includes play sufficiency assessments, research and action planning with municipalities and national organisations, consultancy on neighbourhood regeneration, developing evidence-based design recommendations, and working with schools and arts and cultural organisations to develop playful practices.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

During the first Coronavirus lockdown in the UK, a strange phenomenon was seen in towns and cities across the country. As councils became unable, or unwilling, to maintain their usual programmes of spraying weeds and cutting grass, pavements began to feature what had previously been dismissed as 'weeds'. In response, and using a hashtag #MoreThanWeeds, people began using chalk to circle them and to write their names, both common and Latin.   In this podcast we explore how different the future would be if we were to cultivate a culture of better understanding and loving weeds. How would it affect the world around us, and how would it affect us? And how does the way we talk about that dazzling diversity of plants that we dismiss as 'weeds' give insights to how many people 'other' groups of people such as immigrants? What does our attitude to weeds tell us about ourselves?   For this, our fifteenth episode, we are joined by two people who have been central to this chalky-fingered rebellion. Sophie Leguil is a freelance botanical consultant, writer, translator and nature tour leader. In 2019, she created the project "More Than Weeds", which hopes to change people's perception of urban flora and inspire authorities to adopt biodiversity-friendly practices. Sophie previously worked for the charity Plant Heritage, developing initiatives to conserve the diversity of garden plants in the UK. Having lived in Brussels and London, she became interested in urban greening issues, particularly in relation to planning. Using her background in ecology and horticulture, she is advocating for better landscaping choices in cities, to create healthy streets and spaces for both humans and wildlife."   Jane Perrone is a freelance journalist, and presenter and producer of indoor gardening podcast On The Ledge. She is currently crowdfunding a book on houseplants called Legends of the Leaf. She loves growing houseplants inside and raising weird veg in her garden, and walking in the countryside with her hound Wolfie. She has a background in news journalism, spending more than 20 years working in local newspapers, then joining the Guardian as a reporter online and working her way up to an online news desk editor. In 2008 she became gardening editor at the Guardian, editing the gardens pages of Weekend magazine, making the Sow, Grow, Repeat podcast with Alys Fowler and writing features, news stories and blogposts. She left in 2017 to become fully freelance.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

One of the things we love most here at 'From What If to What Next' is stories of people bringing imagination to their activism, of impactful, thought-provoking projects that engage our imagination and our playfulness. One of the very best examples of this that we've ever seen is The Bank Job in Walthamstow, London, the work of printmaker Hilary Powell and filmmaker Dan Edelstyn, once described as "an act of generosity rare in the art world".   Following the release of the great new book 'The Bank Job' (published by Chelsea Green), and their impending new film about the project, we were thrilled to invite Dan and Hilary onto the podcast. The Bank Job eradicated £1.2 million of payday lending debt in their community and so much more besides.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

We live in a world where so much political decision-making seems to be based on short-term thinking, the next opinion poll, next quarter, next election, yet so many of the problems we face are the result of our failing to think in the long term. We use the future as a place to dump the problems we can't resolve, to dump our pollution, carbon emissions, the thorny issues we'd rather avoid. Indigenous cultures and wiser civilisations of the past planned and thought with future generations in mind, so why can't we? And how different would the world be if we did?   I am joined for this episode by Roman Krznaric, author of the recent book 'The Good Ancestor: How to Think Long Term in a Short Term World' and one of Britain’s leading popular philosophers, and also by Jane Davidson, author of '#futuregen: Lessons from a Small Country', Pro Vice-Chancellor Emeritus at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David and former Minister for Environment and Sustainability in Wales where she proposed legislation to make sustainability the central organising principle of government - the Wellbeing of Future Generations (Wales) Act.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

In the US, as elsewhere, vast amounts of money are poured into mass incarceration and brutal and violent policing. What if instead that money was invested into the communities that bear the burnt of this approach to criminal justice, into healthcare, wellbeing, opportunity, safety?   Andrea J. Ritchie is a Black lesbian immigrant police misconduct attorney and organizer whose writing, litigation, and advocacy has focused on policing and criminalization of women and LGBT people of color for the past two decades. She is currently Researcher in Residence on Race, Gender, Sexuality and Criminalization at the Barnard Center for Research on Women, where she recently launched the Interrupting Criminalization: Research in Action initiative.   Zach Norris is the Executive Director of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, author of We Keep Us Safe: Building Secure, Just, and Inclusive Communities, and co-founder of Restore Oakland, a community advocacy and training center that will empower Bay Area community members to transform local economic and justice systems and make a safe and secure future possible for themselves and for their families.   I hope listening to this podcast moves you as much as it did to record it.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

So many of those who listen to this podcast are trying, in one way or another, to bring about change in the world. Whether it is the more confrontational activism demonstrated by groups like Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter, or grassroots organising and working to build the alternative, we are all trying to understand how to be the most effective activists we can possibly be.   Which leads us to this episode’s question, one sent in by subscriber Elke Himmelmann.   Scilla Elworthy is a three times Nobel Peace Prize nominee for her work with Oxford Research Group to develop effective dialogue between nuclear weapons policy-makers worldwide and their critics. Her most recent book is The Mighty Heart: how to transform conflict (2020).   Robert Philips founded Jericho in 2013 after a 25-year career at the top of the global communications industry. He leads its work on Responsible Tax, Good Work, Social Justice in Tech, Housing, Energy and Infrastructure. He is the chair of #JerichoConversations.   Please consider supporting the podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/fromwhatiftowhatnext and becoming a patron.

Exploring the deep implications of decolonizing education, the podcast discusses a future with communal learning, universal basic income for knowledge acquisition, and nationalized access to knowledge. It also delves into the psychological effects of neglecting history education and challenges faced by marginalized communities in shaping their identity.