Looking forward to a weekend of work – and fun

Our campaigning and outreach skillshare is fast approaching and I am starting to look forward to it.

Firstly, a weekend out of the city, with a chance to walk up some nice hills, spend time with interesting people and eat nice food, but maybe that’s a bit too consumerist of me!

These sort of activist get togethers actually seem to be best when lots of people contribute, and you go away challenged, inspired, and reminded about what’s really important instead of just well fed.

So will the weekend manage to do all of this?

We’ll be hearing from local groups who have put huge amounts of time and energy reaching out to their communities, suggesting greener ways to live. There’ll be training on the

latest thinking about energy, and workshops on how we can stop the most powerful players in our society (the banks?) investing in stupidly destructive projects just to make a quick buck.

I’m particularly looking forward to hearing from Jess Worth, who has co-founded the UK Tar Sands network, trying to stop this oil extraction method from continuing, for the sake of local people and the planet. She also used to write for the New Internationalist, and has done lots of campaigning in her time. I’m sure she’ll have a story or two to share.

Workshops

And then on Sunday there’ll be some more in-depth workshops. Even though I’ve already heard it, I can’t wait to hear Beth’s workshop on ‘Economics for a Finite Planet.’ It completely blew my mind the first time – did you know banks don’t really have the money they lend you?! – so I’m hoping to try to understand it more fully this time!

We’ll finish off with some workshops to help with the practicalities of actually deciding on things and doing them with other people. Facilitation training to make meetings productive and democratic; and more practical tips that come in handy when you’re campaigning.

Add to this plenty of time to eat together, have good chats and some fresh air. Oh, and not to forget my favourite session – creative banner making! A great Saturday afternoon activity in anyone’s book!

The weekend takes place 1-3 April in Pitlochry. Book your free place now