Celebrate Earth Day at the Green Apple Festival Sunday, April 20th!

On Sunday, April 20, in Denver’s City Park, Cottonwood Institute will be participating in the largest Earth Day celebration in the history of the Front Range!  The 1st Annual Green Apple Music Festival will occur from Noon to 6 p.m., and will feature a wide variety of green businesses, organic and natural food vendors, nonprofit organizations, speakers, and music by local and national bands such as the Neville Brothers, Rose Hill Drive, and the Duo.  The Green Apple Music Festival is FREE and will be occurring simultaneously in eight US Cities, making it America’s largest Earth Day Festival.  Come be part of the fun as we celebrate the beauty and majesty of Mother Earth.

The Cottonwood Institute is looking for CAP and CI Alumni to help volunteer at the Green Apple Music Festival at City Park. We need help representing the Cottonwood Institute at our booth, while soaking in some rays and listing to great live music. If you can make it down to Denver for an hour or two to help us out, please email Jamie Dent: jamie@cottonwoodinstitute.org.

For more information about the event, go to Green Apple Festival Website.

Smoke, no fire…yet.

The CAP class spent Tuesday’s session at the park across the street working some bow drill skills, with special guest instructor and Cottonwood Institute founder Ford Church lending a hand.  Although the bow drill is an extremely difficult skill to learn and master, the students pushed through their difficulties and kept working at it even after many frustrating setbacks.  Most students/groups got at least a bit of smoke today, a great start, and one that we’ll build off as the quarter goes on.

Click here to see the rest of today’s pictures

Cordage and Tea

Students spent class today researching and utilizing Stinging Nettle, a plant well-known to native people for its nutritive properties, its medicinal uses and for producing the strongest plant-fiber cordage in the natural world.   Students sampled Nettle leaf tea, and discussed The Sacred Question.

Special thanks to Jessie and JJ (our newest TA) for their assistance as we learned cordage.

How Green are Solar Panels?

In many circumstances, the products we use in our efforts to be more
sustainable have a bigger footprint than we think. Recent articles in
the Washington Post and from the Worldwatch Institute
show how the production of large amounts of polysilicon in China are
dumping toxic wastes on the surrounding landscape—the homes of poor
Chinese villagers. The byproducts from these industrial processes
include silicon tetrachloride, which ruins the soil chemistry and
releases poisonous fumes. The situation is ironically inconsistent with
the end use of this valuable product, which is usually for photovoltaic
solar panels, which turn solar energy into "green, renewable"
electricity. This is actually only one example of the ways that efforts
by the developed world to become sustainable only result in more
environmental degradation and socio-economic disparities.

The
situation in [one Chinese] village points to the environmental
trade-offs the world is making as it races to head off a dwindling
supply of fossil fuels. Forests are being cleared to grow biofuels like
palm oil, but scientists argue that the disappearance of such huge
swaths of forests is contributing to climate change. Hydropower dams
are being constructed to replace coal-fired power plants, but they are
submerging whole ecosystems under water. –washingtonpost.com

Producing
polysilicon is extremely profitable due to high demand, and the Chinese
manufacturers are increasing their profits by refusing to invest in
recycling technology, which is available now. The manufacturers
apparently have the law on their side. They maintain that their
practices are in keeping with all Chinese environmental restrictions,
and while formal complaints have been made to portions of the
government responsible for environmental protection, no action has been
taken.

Guiding Questions:

To what extent is the industrial production of a product the
responsibility of the various stake holders: the government, the
impacted villagers, the company producing the material, the companies
that buy the materials to produce the  end product, and the eventual
consumer? Also, what can a potential consumer (or just a concerned
individual) in the US do to oppose this kind of situation?

Survivorman Movie Night

One man – alone in the wilderness for seven days. No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools. Survivorman star Les Stroud has what it takes to survive, do you? To find out, join the Cottonwood Institute and REI this Thursday, April 3, 2008 as we host a Survivorman Movie Night. We will watch an episode of the hit television show Survivorman and hold an informal discussion to share survival priorities, tips, strategies, and techniques. This free clinic will be held at 7pm at the REI store in Boulder.

New quarter, new instructor…

The CAP class at PS1 started the new quarter with new instructor Steve McCue, who will be taking over for Megan to finish off the year.  The class spent the day discussing the import of Awareness, a skill absolutely essential for survival in both natural and urban settings.  The class finished the day with rehearsal for tomorrow’s convocation presentation.

Winter Survival Skills

Last Saturday, the Cottonwood Institute conducted a winter survival skills course outside of Nederland, CO. As a first time participant, I was unsure of what to expect, but I found the course to be informative and loads of fun. We began by snowshoeing to a base camp location and creating an interactive survival scenario that involved a discussion of survival priorities, tips, strategies, and techniques. Our group then continued with learning and actually building two different winter survival structures, the Quinzhee snow shelter and the emergency snow trench. We were also taught modern fire methods such as the one-match fire and using a petroleum covered cottonball to sustain a flame. Other skills involved winter water procurement, rescue methods and techniques, and finally, how to build our own personal survival kit. I found that whether you are an experienced winter camping guru or a casual snowshoer like myself, the skills that were learned could definitely save your life.

CAP Pre-Course Survey, 4th Quarter 2008

Welcome to the Community Adventure Program. Before we get started, we
need to get some feedback about your outdoor experience, your thoughts
about the environment, the community, etc. Please answer this survey
honestly and to the best of your ability. The good folks who fund this
class use this information to assess the performance of the class and
this information will help us acquire new grants. Please Click Here to Take Survey.

Register For A Course And Win Tickets To See Jack Johnson!

Jack Johnson has generously donated 2 tickets to the Cottonwood Institute for his sold out show at Red Rocks
this summer on Sunday, August 17, 2008. Thanks to this amazing
donation, the Cottonwood Institute is excited to announce the following
promotional opportunity: All new students that Register for one of our 2008 Courses
will be entered into a drawing to receive 2 tickets to the sold out
Jack Johnson show at Red Rocks on Sunday, August 17, 2008. New
registrations must be postmarked between March 10, 2008 and June 2,
2008 (see rules and restrictions below). The winner will be posted to
the Cottonwood Institute Blog on Monday, June 9, 2008. For more information, Click Here.

The Next Step

In a recent poll by Outside Magazine, 57% of people think that the environmental movement is finally turning the corner and making a difference. With the organic industry booming and the fact that 754 major U.S. cities have signed the Kyoto climate agreement, things are indeed looking up. Now, more than ever, it is imperative that we focus on taking the next step to live green.

The Cottonwood Institute is taking the next step and walking our talk in terms of environmental sustainability. We recently partnered with the Green Heart Institute to purchase wind credits to offset our CO2 emissions. We use 100% post consumer waste recycled paper and our paper is printed by Alphagraphics, a company certified by Partners for a Clean Environment. Every year we offer the Mt. Evans Volunteer Project as a free program to get up in the high country and give back to the mountains we all love and enjoy. Finally, our core programming initiative, the Community Adventure Program, received the 2006 Environmental Education Award for Excellence in the Citizen and Community category from the Colorado Alliance for Environmental Education (CAEE) and our courses are designed to inspire students to become environmental stewards both in the backcountry and throughout their daily lives.

Guiding Question: What are some other ways in your personal or professional life you can challenge yourself or your company to take it to the next step in terms of living green?