The Land & Leadership Initiative is a deeply participatory, community-driven school founded by author and educator Didi Pershouse.
We provide strategic support and educational opportunities for current and emerging leaders, helping them to see and act on the potential to address society's major challenges—food, water, climate, conflict, health—by collaborating with nature and each other.
Our aim is to grow and support collaborative, multi-partisan leadership in the soil health movement, worldwide.
Our aim is to grow and support collaborative, multi-partisan leadership in the soil health movement, worldwide.
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Human and environmental health begins with the soil and grows upward from there. People involved in our school work to create healthier, more resilient, and more empowered communities by focusing on the regeneration of healthy soil and the "Soil Carbon Sponge" which is the infrastructure that makes life on land possible.
A healthy soil sponge soaks up rain, filters water, and maintains its structural integrity even when wet, thereby preventing flooding, drought, wildfires, erosion, mudslides, and algae blooms. Our 2018-2019 activity highlights included: • An 18-event speaking and listening tour across North America. • Seven, multi-week video-conference discussion courses for over 200 current and emerging community leaders from around the world: Regenerating the Soil Carbon Sponge for Flood, Drought and Wildfire Resilience. • Discussion courses on Writing for Regeneration, and Consensus-based Holistic Policy Writing and Analysis. • A webinar series related to the science of soil health and cooling, success stories of bipartisan policy, and large-scale implementation of soil health principles. • A 6-day conference (2018) and a five-day strategic gathering (2019) focusing on the Soil Carbon Sponge as a leverage point for social, economic, and environmental success. |
Our courses and webinars are geared towards people who want to organize or lead soil health initiatives in their own regions.
We have a strong focus on methods for communicating more effectively about soil's central role in preventing extreme weather events, public health, and thriving economies. We also focus on methods of building strong working relationships between people from different backgrounds and often with differing political or cultural views--towards common aims. We welcome people from all backgrounds in these courses, and we usually have an international group of farmers, ranchers, policy makers, teachers, college students, scientists, engineers, and others who see the potential to make big changes by putting soil at the center. |
If you want to learn how to make your farm more resilient to droughts and floods, then here is your chance!
Didi is fantastic at explaining how to fix our broken water cycle.
— Gail Fuller, Farmer
Our courses and workshops are designed to give you the tools to facilitate, lead, and support soil health initiatives in your own region. You will come away with an understanding of whole-systems landscape function, communication and consensus building strategies, and a well-founded hope for the future.
RECENT WEBINARS & COURSES
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In this webinar with Walter Jehne (hosted by Land and Leadership Founder, Didi Pershouse), we answered questions about restoring water cycles for cooling and rehydration of landscapes at a local, regional, and global scale, as well as questions about the soil sponge that underlies all healthy functional landscapes and water cycles.
This webinar is now available on demand for a sliding scale fee. Effective writing can open the doors to financial resources, meetings with policy makers, invitations to speak at conferences, and opportunities for deep discussions with your neighbors.
Clear, compelling writing can help people shift to a new way of seeing and understanding landscapes, change people's minds about what's important, and drive them to action. Whether or not you think of yourself as a writer, everyone is welcome in this course, which will focus on developing your ability to share accurate information about soil health and whole-systems ecosystem function, in ways that people will love to read. Much of it will spring from the context of your own landscape, community, ideas, and life. The ongoing course is now accepting new members. If you're interested, contact Didi. |
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In these highly interactive weekly sessions, we focus on creating policies that are holistically sound (social/cultural, economic, and ecological) with a broad base of favorable support. This methodology will be based on recent successful processes that have enabled healthy soil legislation to pass in New Mexico this winter.
This course is taught by Jeff Goebel, a leading expert in consensus building, conflict resolution, and regenerative solutions who helps individuals and communities attain their goals and remove the obstacles that lie in the way, with over thirty years of national and international successes. As an award-winning consultant in private practice, he has worked on catalyzing positive change from non-profits to government agencies, multi-national corporations to small family ranchers. The ongoing course is now accepting new members. If you're interested, contact Didi. |
I can’t speak highly enough of Didi’s work. If you’d like to understand soil health and regeneration: this is a must.
— Gregory Landua, CEO of Regen Network