Our Foundation Programme
Our new Foundation Programme lays the groundwork for all future APW education. It translates over a decade of on‑the‑ground teaching and over 20 years of professional practice into a format that is accessible, flexible, and scalable.
The Foundation Programme is On Line-first, providing access to all course resources so participants can learn at their own pace and in their own time. This is supported by webinars and an online community forum that enable ongoing peer-to-peer discussion, reflection, and shared learning.
On Line learning is complemented by Local Learning Communities made up of bioregional, community, and whānau learning hubs, as well as On Ground workshops and In Community events, supporting participants to connect learning to place, relationships, and real-world practice.
The programme is composed of seven inter-connected courses, each building conceptual understanding while supporting participants to apply learning in their own contexts. Together, these courses form a coherent learning journey that helps people move from awareness to meaningful action.
This new format allows APW to reach a far wider audience than has previously been possible through face‑to‑face delivery alone—without compromising depth, quality, or kaupapa.
The 7 Foundation Programme Courses
Laying the Foundations - Introduces permaculture ethics and principles, weaving diverse disciplines and indigenous wisdom to cultivate systems thinking and empower regenerative, meaningful action.
Ecological Literacy -Cultivates ecological understanding, enabling participants to see Earth as an interconnected system and navigate environmental and social challenges through a holistic lens.
Empathic Enquiry -Explores the meta-crisis with curiosity and compassion, inviting deep reflection while offering practical frameworks to navigate change collectively.
Design Thinking -Builds core design capability, refining participants’ ability to apply a design lens creatively and effectively across diverse contexts.
Ecological Design -Focuses on designing with natural patterns and processes, integrating permaculture and regenerative principles to address ecological, social, and technical challenges.
Social Innovation -Equips participants with collaborative design approaches to address complex social challenges across cultural, political, economic, and community contexts.
Appropriate Technology -Explores simple, locally sourced, replicable technologies, developing practical solutions that serve people, place, nature, and future generations.
Our First Foundation Course - Laying the Foundations
Laying the Foundations is the first course in the APW Foundation Programme and provides an introduction to our approach to permaculture, its philosophy, ethics and design principles.
The course consists of 18 lessons, including prerecorded video lessons, supported by our Learning Management System (LMS), online hui, extensive resources, an online forum, and a suite of self-directed explorations, applications and reflections that can be completed individually, with others, or through a Local Learning Community.
How the course works?
Laying the Foundations is delivered in three phases over 12 weeks, with six lessons in each phase. New lessons are released each week, which include new video content with supporting resources and activities, giving you time to explore and apply the ideas before moving on.
Most video lessons take around 20–60 minutes to watch. Each lesson also includes optional explorations, applications and reflections designed to help you connect the course material with your own life, interests and place.
These activities are deliberately flexible. You might spend 10–20 minutes reflecting on a question, or several hours following an area of enquiry, exploring your local environment or putting an idea into practice. There is no expectation that you complete everything — you can engage at a level that works with your interests, circumstances and available time.
As a guide, we recommend allowing around 1–2 hours per week for the core course, with plenty of opportunities to go deeper if you have the time and interest.
The course also includes four two-hour online hui, held in the evenings across the 12 weeks. These provide opportunities to connect with tutors and other participants, discuss the course material, ask questions and share what you are discovering.
You can also choose to participate in a Local Learning Community (LLC) — a bioregional, community- or whānau-based learning group where participants can meet, discuss ideas and put their learning into practice together. LLCs are self-organising and flexible, so the format and time commitment will depend entirely on each group.
What will we explore?
The first six lessons provide some scene-setting and context for understanding APW's approach to permaculture and design, alongside historical, ecological and sociocultural frames for understanding permaculture and the world in which we are practising it today.
The following twelve videos explore David Holmgren's permaculture design principles and provide an introduction to the essence, theory and practice of permaculture. Derived from observations of the natural world and enduring sustainable societies, these principles provide ways of thinking and acting with curiosity and creativity. They help guide our kaupapa, encourage us to think in terms of living systems, and provide a coherent framework for approaching design and action.
As the name suggests, Laying the Foundations provides the groundwork for the rest of the APW Foundation Programme, and a pathway into our future Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC), Permaculture Diploma and other learning opportunities.
APW has been teaching permaculture for over 14 years and supporting permaculture education initiatives across the motu for even longer.
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