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To Catch The Rain
Tell us a little about yourself.
So, I’m an instructor at Humble State University in far northern California. to make real projects all around the world
in summers we’re teaching in other countries
- India
- Dominican Republic
- Mexico
- El Salvador
always with the same kind of intent which is to work together to find out what people need
not coming in with solutions, locally or internationally.
we don’t come in thinking know we know the answer we just come in with the excitement of working together.
We work with a lots of grade schools k-12
- agriculture
- garden infrastructure
Zane middle school
- rain water catchment
- edible landscaping
- solar power robot stations
- human powered sundials
- permeable pavement
all type of projects to raise the educational experience with the engagement as well as an environment that’s really nurturing
You know if students are catching their own rain and using that to grow their own food on campus they’re education is heightened.
I’m so excited this year to be somewhere were recycling is valued, recess is 4 times a day! There’s an outdoor classroom! My kids are big into legos so solar powered robots sounds great!
educational experiences
oh yeah so we pretty much just adapted that project
stay outside and be inspired by the sun!
You’re organization sounds like my ideal of the Peace Corps. My question with the Peaces Corps is why do they not send 6 people to one place instead of 1 person to 6 places?
I do international work because I love learning. I have a bigger impact in my own local community because I know where to find stuff and who’s gonna donate
pushing my mind in that way
so it becomes really apparent when I;m doing that I’m gonna the more I just shut up and listen
better the projects are gonna go
My first international project almost 20 years ago didn’t go as well is because I built it in the U.S. before it shipped, I had no idea what people needed and so ultimately I think I just wasted their money
open community meetings
people talk about what they need
so same thing when we work with the school. Meet with teachers and staff and say we did this in the past, and then we talk about what are people’s needs right now
brainstorming needs
which ones people want to prioritize and which ones people are willing to work on.
they might say we really need a new pathway but no one is willing to work on it so the pathway dies
right now are working with
6 rivers
Arcadia high school
large agriculture learning area last year we put in a 60 foot chain link
jail cell for rocks that you will sometimes see on the freeway.
We put 60 feet of that, taking what was once a farro area that a high school he called it
zone of no hands land
zone of total segregation
To describe the wasteland now it’s a great agriculture area land that used to be there
turning it into this large ag area
classes
next year
planting harvesting
for me its very exiting
have my university students working with students to improve their own education
agri
I love that. A lot of kids don’t really understand what it’s like to go to college. I feel like, after going through a college campus to get home through middle school was a big influence.
so important right now, a lot of conversations about.
Knowing that college isn’t scary.
And thinking that you could do more. Like if I had known that being an environmental lawyer was a thing I probably would have done that.
a local engineer getting advice
real person who is doing real engineering
high school students
see what an
look a lot like them they are only a few years older
before and after engagements what students think about university
real data
It seems like students are more likely to go to university after they have worked with students.
They do have those upward bound programs for kids who have one or less parents that went to college.
Then they get to do that through:
- agriculture
- gardening
- touching the soil
learning these things
Up in California a lot of our students get to touch nature
Students in NY. who have not had experience. I went to college in NY.
This project is called the swale. It’s an art engagement
still ones that done
5000 square feet of food forest floating east of the hudson
community for a month
- pick food for free
- classes on food justice
- dying with plants
- food selection
- cooking classes
free for all community
20k people from 2017-18 onboard
many were students 3 days a week there are groups of classroom coming to visit with their teachers.
How does that work?
It just stays put, we don’t have people on it when it’s moved. We took an old sand barge
100s of tons
- soil
- rocks
- plants
- solar plants
- rain water treatment
- river water treatment
docs for a month or half
stays put except it’s floating kind of back and forth
gives you the most surreal experience you walk on it and it tills there’s an orchard of 8 local indigenous trees. All the plants are
- edible
- medicinal
surrounding by nature
in the city at least my brain does this thing where it makes it look like the city is moving
experience of this background city bobbing up and down which I really enjoy.
its so big the movement is actually kind of sutle unless a storm is coming in.
When it’s being moved by tug boats in more open water
then you could get seas
juxtaposition
this idea
you have to know the background
the visionary is Mary Matelingly
teaches at pratt
quite a few projects
this idea came was born out of the fact in NY it is illegal to grow public food
you can’t do it. You can have private food
can’t grow public food for public use on public land.
Is that because they are worried people would get sick?
I found out was a law in Pheonix, AZ is they worry if someone is going to get hurt harvesting fruit on a ladder or something.
lawsuit
what phoenix AZ did they planted ornamental orange trees which is about the most insulting, since we
we are not going to grow
in NY I am not positive that’s what it is
pests
are an issue with pests if you had food that people weren’t picking it would be rotting, I assert if you work with local communities you can make a situation where food is not going to get wasted.
maritime law is different is on the water
well over a 100 people who would be considered a major contributor
plus volunteers
20 youth between the ages of 16-24
youth ministries of peace and justice
concrete park
docents
helped build
led tours
bronx is really interested
Hunts Point, the majority of food goes through there, all of the packaging is done but you can’t find organic food
you don’t get to keep that
More waste transfer stations then transfered to disposal, more waste transfer stations then grocery stores?
Why is that?
poverty
I’m getting out of my area of expertise. I’m really good at building the solutions
I’m not an expert on what all the social and engineered reasons are that these communities of poverty end up in urban food deserts
increasingly talked about term.
These urban areas where people can’t find food
ron finley the gangsta gardener
check out his work
- political
- historical
possibly
nefarious reasons
urban poor communities
you mentioned appropedia
I’m the president
new executive director
in el salvador
got to visit with him
reinvigorate
website for communities and individuals
everyday and
visiting to the site
60,000 pages
10s of thousands of incredible solutions
ones I am focusing
rain water ones
solar ones
next book will be coming out
to catch the sun
small scale solar
rain water catchment
all around the world
right a book so more projects could happen by more people
judge the success of the book
terry gross
she interviewed me
otherwise
feel like it was a failure
purely creative endeavors
rubrics
sales
downloads avail completely for free
stories I got from communities people building with it
incredible
many countries
open for schools
orphanages
totally in love with right now
50 miles south of here
teacher ended up coming to one of my presentations
came to the conference for teachers
she came
I presented
I broke the teachers into teams with flip chart markers
I’m gonna design my school, she showed it off
then she did it
put in a giant rainwater system
this school is 97% assisted lunch program
in need of food
water that they are catching
watering about an acre of pumpkins
students sell
learn about business to support their school
use d for another acre for agriculture and gardens using in school lunches
catching their own rainwater
grow their own food
lunch programm
teacher this was not her passion
hell bent on this this is my incredible passion
her passion is teaching and providing the students
another project is in a similar vain in Haiti
future maker
first met him in Haiti
walk to a dirty river to get water to grow their garden
sell to raise money to continue getting an education
based upon the book
catching some rainwater
$600 more us dollars
all of their water from rainwater catchment
rainwater catchment
students have clean water
not have to travel
there’s a lot of reasons to have the hope
childhood mortality
we have completely changed the related around that
before the age of 5
very little all around the world
heading in that direction
women going to school
dropped precipitancy
obscene
lack of
ways to attack
focus on small projects and communities
it will only work
people doing it
nothing incredible special
only a few people can do this
yeah!
I love visiting systems I had nothing to do with
systems I made like 8 years ago
problems
most people have enough roof
storage is often a much bigger issue
how are ewe going to catch enough
issue I commonly see
forgetting to put in a first flush
first few minutes of rainfall
90% of dirtiness
collecting stuff on your roof especially if it’s been dry for a while
commercial versions avail
first 10 minutes diverted on landscaping
local farm
dirtyish water to clean tools and workbooks
people don’t notice
you won’t notice
tank is getting so much
hopefully longest lasting version
take a pipe
I put a floating ball in it
plug that pipe once it’s full
water will then go to the tank
water would go down into the pipe
once the
so that it slowly evacuates verifier the next rain
I don’t have to be responsible for opening it between rains
that down pipe will fill up with dirty water
before the next rain
little bit different
pipe valve that changes
first flush
how much you don’t worry about
if you are using it for drinking a lot more careful
I have tried to maintain gardens in the past
herbs that are part of my own garden
when I am in town for enough time
CSA
community
I’ll go to a farm
go pick my veggies
I show up
they wrote on the blackboard
how much I can pick that week
pick the rest
get to touch the soil
plants
don’t have to do as
flow is really nice
the one that I have been part of in the past
most recently
one day a week you can show up
sign up
take this
this is what you can have
pound of these
15 Brussels sprouts
5 pieces of chard
whatever it is
gardener are incredible
I’ve heard you
Tell me about your first gardening experience?
such a powerful question
on swale I’ve gotten to witness a lot of students picking food they are going to eat
seed
incredible
sad
but
immeshed in NYC
connection to nature
NY is one of the cities doing nature connection pretty well
for me
making me become a designer
engineering
was a garden
Idk how old I was somewhere between 6-9 and in my opinion way too old
much younger
with my mom, visiting a friend in phoenix AZ
bowl of strawberries
so good
glistening
cold
I had one
she saw me staring and said d have another
one of those kids
ate a lot of strawberries
later that day
we go in her back yard
and she’s like those are the strawberries you were eating
the flavor made my tongue explode
should have been part of my knowledge as a human
consumer products
strawberries
created by nature an the woman who was serving me the strawberries
right there in her hard
2nd or 3rd time
we can really
check out appropedia
rain water
gardening
solar animals
solar dehydration
wonder if I can build this
appropedia
ugly site
someday we’ll make it pretty
they’ve been really supportive and helpful
nitty gritty info
type of stuff you wont find anywhere else
first written about 10 years ago
5 years later
10 years later
I think
I’m guessing that your listeners
pretty photos of seemingly good ideas
in actuality the ideas just don’t work
on pinterest
when I’m looking for a new garden idea
sometimes the tweaks are small
gray water
in retrospect
saw this cloth filter
we had to use this metal screen
as a reader
bypass this problem
also could be research for people who want to change local laws
that’s the idea
making all of us our own
individuals we don’t have the
r&d
research and development
be each others development
like you said
this is what is happening in this community
they made it work
in part for that
we were able to change the law in Eureka CA on where your water can be so you can use the natural flows of nature even if it violates the set back law
book is broke into 3 sections
stories of how communities come together
diy
these are all the parts
adaptable
community you are in
5 different ways
storage tanks
homemade
saurbraut
math and science
you can skip that
real go in and challenge yourself
math and science
adapt
rainwater
raw water
fog capture
natural landscaping
learning how to use gravity
friction
storage
flow rates in a more mathematical
the book
we included so it could be included in the curriculum
most of our readers are never going to lock at
students who are using it
many educators have found
understand why
not just the what
how
why am I learning this
no student is hurt by understanding the why they are learning this
student learns about geometry
some students if they don’t have a why
they just can’t engage
understanding how to calculate area
and multiply that by
water you are storing
moment your needs
self sufficient by geometry
that’s how the math and science
math were doing
leads you through the math
c
put a ball in a basket
ok there’s a ball in there
there’s a trap door
they’ve seen magic
their mind is blown
doing math
didn’t work out
one ball
really type of math
we’re talking about
different units
comes more complex
maybe spreadsheet
of course is available for free
when I wrote this book
100 beta readers
people who told me still missing
weren’t getting
incredible diagrams
graphic
3d designer
Gabriel
krause
he drew
might just have to look at the picture
the most
straight down
rainfall is coming straight down on average
then it doesn’t matte rid your roof is pitched
your only catching the projection of that rain
square footage of the bottom
solar noon
sun is directly
flat
what you can find locally
standard pipe
pvc
really easy to put together
I can always find replacement parts
little bit of knowledge to work with it
water will find it’s way
if you tinker that you can contain
u will see this where people have joined pvc incorrectly
sealer outside the joint
when you work with pvc
sand the end
clean and sand the end
quick sand
pvc cement on there
when you combine the pieces vive them a twist
not a glue in a typical way
chemical reacting with that glue
fusing the tow together
doing the prep and doing it right
comeback later at put a seal around the points
another spot
water will try to squeeze out
any holes that you put in
tap for instance to your container
bulkhead fitting
threaded pipe that has washers on both sides
squeeze them together
forming a seal where you have installed your tape
couple of things for working with pvc
metal
bamboo
locally available
people know how to work with
person installing it feels comfortable
appropedia has even more of it
youtube videos
people working with all the different materials
what fits your
absolutely
combining rain water and solar
last semester
drip irrigation for a food forest
where there roof is is at the same level or below where their drip irrigation
you can’t rely on gravity
when its not raining
storage
catches rain water off the roof
pumps via solar power
pumps up to a larger tank
about 275 gallons
sure that your listeners have seen them
plastic square
meter by meter
food grade one of them
oversized solar panel
any sun
pumpkin up to that other tank
small timer
drip irrigation system
UPPER TANK
has the water
pressure to provide for the drip irrigation system
year round
more people gardening
I love that there are some people that love it more then me and will produce a whole bunch of it
more gardens I can help build rainwater and solar
their herbs and write with me
resources on appropedia
book avaialable for free
proceeds go directly to appropedia a as non profit
more into the infrastructure of hearing
purchasing the book helps to spread the word to more
attractive
some of our readers have made small catchment pollinator gardens
trickling through year round
stop and hydrate
not something I thought about
people would make these just for pollinators
excited about with the next bok
solar arrays
making them pollinator friendly
collect water off our solar panels
those don’t collect water through the roof
I like that you can some of that our way
it’s very cold and wet
perfect
in this time of global time of climate change
happening
storage is a way we can build some resilience into this weather pattern
restore your water table
slowing down the amount of water that’s coming once
impermeable
roofs and sidewalks
catching it
really fun to get to you
to
age wise I would be a gem her
action wise they just don’t know
given my sense of humor
every once
Final question- if there was one change you would like to see to create a greener world what would it be? For example is there a charity or organization your passionate about or a project you would like to see put into action. What do you feel is the most crucial issue facing our planet in regards to the environment either in your local area or on a national or global scale?
personal empowerment
better place for humans in the future
more people making change right now
don’t have enough power to make change
that isn’t true
just get started
join up with other local people in your community
all of us together
in different ways
political level
activist
making stuff
not feeling like ow can do
How do we connect with you?
probably the majority in the US
individuals and communities
appropedia
reach out
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