Summer Session | June 22 - August 14
Fall Session | September 7 - October 30
Sustainable Living Skills Internship
Our flagship program, running its seventeenth year has grown to stay on top of the issues of these changing times. Aside from the core focus areas described below, the program incorporates the development of local food networks and Community Supported Agriculture (CSA). As an intern you will be immersed in daily hands-on experience and practice of living sustainability with us on our 40 acre rural campus.
Daily classes concentrate on three major subject areas: Sustainable Forestry, Organic Gardening, Appropriate Technology. Other intriguing classes round out the curriculum. Participants come from varied backgrounds and have ranged in age from 17 to 64+; they include undergraduate students, graduate students, and those outside the formal educational system wishing to acquire additional life skills and perspectives.
Cost: $2,850 - $3,850 (sliding scale). Includes instruction, housing, food, and class materials. 
Click here to enroll online or by post.
Class Descriptions
Organic Gardening
The organic gardening class at Aprovecho provides a basic understanding of the principles and practices associated with running an organic, integrated, and thriving food production system, including perennials and water management. We will explore options for urban systems, as well as for different climates and bio regions. The garden class is based on a whole-systems perspective in which the garden is part of the human-made environment, with the underlying belief that our influence and skill can create a world of abundance, even in the midst of challenging circumstances.
Introduction to Aprovecho’s Garden
Take a tour to understand the workings of the garden and how you will be helping it come to fruition
History of Agriculture
Learn about the origins of various agricultural systems from around the world, and how they relate to choices that we make today as both producers and consumers.
Soil Ecology
Learn the basics of soil biology, chemistry, and ecology so that you can make informed choices about organic garden management. Remember, the health of your garden depends on the health of your soil!
Bed Preparation
Sheet mulch? Lasagna gardening? French Biointensive? Raised beds? How do you know what to choose? We will learn about all of these methods and more, examine the pros and cons of each, and see them in action in our garden.
Botany and Plant Physiology
We will examine the basics of plant structure and identification, especially as it relates to common crops.
Seed Starting and Transplanting
Learn about making soil mixes, which plants to direct sow, which to transplant, and the whys and how's of each.
Soil Fertility Management: Compost, Cover Crops and Mulches, Oh My!
Learn all about the different methods to organically improve your soil for long-term tilth and plant health.
Crop Rotation and Planning
Learn how to plan your own CSA or market garden. Some basic math required, but it’s fun!
Pruning and Care of Perennials
Enhance productivity and longevity of fruiting plants through careful management strategies.
Asexual Propagation
Start your own nursery! Re-vegetate your yard, neighborhood, city, state, nation, world! All you need is a pair of clippers and a little know how, and we will be re-greening the planet before we know it.
Irrigation
How much water do different plants need? We will investigate the wonders of watering well without waste.
Winter Gardening
Strategies for year-round harvest in different climates.
Weeds, Pest, and Disease Management
The question that organic gardeners are asked most often will be answered in this class, from a whole systems perspective that puts these organisms in context of their ecosystem.
Click here to enroll online or by post.
Sustainable Forestry
Introduction to Eco-Forestry
Get familiar with the basic tenants of eco-forestry and forest ecology while walking the woods of Aprovecho. Also explore the watershed context of our forest system as we hike to the headwaters of our creek.
Old Growth Forest Hike
Bill Mollison once said, "If we lose all of the major universities, we lose nothing. If we lose the forests, we lose everything." We will spend time with one of our greatest teachers, the ancient forest, developing a sense of the once and future forest potential of the Pacific Northwest and considering themes of forest succession and climax.
Timber and Non-timber forest products
The forest at Aprovecho provides us with all of our construction lumber and fuel for cooking and heating; it also yields many other products from medicinal herbs, mushrooms, material for green woodworking, and edible foods. This class will be an introduction to these products and their uses. We will cover timber products, discussing the wood materials used in the construction of our various buildings on site and walking through the production of the lumber from harvest to finished product. Woodland plants and their uses as well as construction of green wood tools and crafts will be discussed in regard to non-timber forest products.
Forest Surveying
The first in a three-day series that begins with surveying work, follows with tree falling, and finishes with horse drawn transport. Proper surveying represents the mathematical basis for sustainable forestry and allows one to remove timber from a stand in a way that not only maintains its overall vitality but actually can leave regenerative and positive impacts on the forest. Subjects include surveying for tree height, age, growth rate, and stand growth in board feet over time.
Tree Falling and Yarding
Using our survey work as a basis for deciding which and how many trees to cut, all students will learn how to fall and transport trees using people powered technologies like the crosscut saw, axe, and wheeled arch.
Horse Logging
After being cut, trees too large to be transported by humans are left in the forest to be moved by a team of Shire Draught Horses. Students will learn to make trail, set chokers for the downed trees, and stack logs in the yard deck while working with the horses in the woods.
Mushroom Cultivation
Join our resident fungophyles in an exploration of the mushroom kingdom. After an introduction to mushroom lifecycles and culture, we will gather mushrooms in our surrounding forest. In order to ensure an enhanced cuisine, we will also propagate some well-known edible mushrooms using oak and alder logs.
Bamboo
Bamboo represents an ecologically sustainable, economically viable, and durable alternative to wood and even metal for a myriad of uses. This class will cover the propagation, maintenance, harvest, and use of this glorified grass.
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Appropriate Technology
Born out of the Gandian revolution in India, Appropriate technology (AT) by definition is technology that is affordable, fixable and maintainable at a village level. This is in juxtaposition to Alternative Technologies such as Solar panels, that may have similar environmental benefit but whose ultimate control is not in our hands. As the definition of a village is somewhat up for debate, at Aprovecho we will work across the entire spectrum of sustainable technologies and through research and discussion attempt discover the true costs of the technologies we use. Through a balance of lecture, discussion and hands on practice we will hopefully reach the true goal of appropriate technology, personal and community empowerment.
The research at Aprovecho is always changing though so there are liable to be some variation in the class schedule. Besides the basic technique of each subject you should expect to learn an array of usefull building skills, including but not limited to, wood working, metal working, welding, ceramics and general mud-tech, just to name a few. Many of us in the west are deprived of some of the simple skills the truly define technology, the science of technique. Once again, hopefully this class will be a class in empowerment more then anything else.
Efficient use of Bio Mass
Wood fired stoves, solar cookers, and hayboxes!!! Oh my!
Aprovecho has been working with improved designs of wood burning stoves for over 30 years. Over half of the world’s population uses wood or other biomass to supply the majority of their energy needs. In actuality wood is nothing less then a solar battery and when used wisely can be the simplest of appropriate technologies. In this class we will look at Aprovecho´s experience in working worldwide with improved wood stoves and look at applications for the resource inundated parts of the world (that’s us by the way) as well. Beyond this we will also look at use of solar ovens and insulated cookers that will further reduce the need to consume fuel.
Heating Water with the Sun
Solar Hot Water heating is probably the most applicable technologies for the western world that we work with. I would safely argue that no household in the world should be without some form of solar hot water system...it is just that much of a no brainer. In this class we will briefly overview the various options in setting up a solar hot water system.
Cost versus benefit analysis will be made. Following a brief description of thermodynamics, assured not to intimidate even the least science minded student, we will have a hands on experience putting together a simple, inexpensive, passive solar shower system using many recycled parts. Students will leave class with a basic understanding of simple plumbing, basic solar principles and thermodynamics, as well as the ability to put together their own system.
Bio Diesel and Veggie Oil conversion
A hot topic of the alternative energy crowd….Is Biodiesel a fad or viable alternative. In this class we will explore the pros and cons of alternative fuel driven transportation. Mike has been making his own bio diesel from waste vegetable oil for the past 7 years and running his car on straight vegetable oil also. We will learn how to make bio diesel in a simple home brew set up and look at the simple process of converting a diesel engine to run on straight waste vegetable oil.
Hydro power
This class is an introduction to small scale hydro power installations. We will watch a short video that covers all the main installation points of a small scale hydro system and learn how to perform a hands on evaluation of a small creek for hydro potential.
Humanure
Working at Aprovecho Research Center for the past 11 years I have build, designed and more importantly used a number of composting toilet systems. In this class we will evaluate these various systems as well as others that the group has experienced. Throughout your stay at Apro you will also get a chance to personally gain the necessary experience to evaluate these options for yourself.
Passive Solar and Natural Building
While stoves have been the technology to put Apro on the world map, in the USofA it is natural building that gave Apro it’s first notoriety. One of Aprovecho’s founders brought the wonderful technique of cobbing to Cascadia. Over the years Aprovecho has fallen in and out of love with this and other natural building technologies, trying to ride the wave between fad and fact. On site we have examples of numerous solar and natural building techniques, including cob, light clay, stawbale, natural plaster, small pole construction, and with any luck this year will add some thatching and a living roof to our repertoire. In the usual Apro fashion we will look at these techniques and using science and experience try to evaluate them each.
Food Dehydration
I believe it would be a safe bet that humans (especially westerners) enjoy (?) the widest diversity of flavors in their diets of any living thing. We also tend to have that diversity span the entire year, but not at a small price to the environment. Fresh foods trucked in from far off warmer climes or grown fresh locally using elaborate hot houses keep us unnaturally fed on our favorite foods year-round. For good or for bad keeping the nutrition flowing outside of the given growing season is a long standing trait of human cultures that has allowed us, along with other animals, to flourish in colder regions of the world. Dehydrated food has been used in ancient times as well as by astronauts in space to bring food where it had never gone before. The main ways we preserve foods at Aprovecho include freezing, canning, dry root cellaring as well as dehydration. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages to be taken into consideration. In this class we will look at the advantages of food dehydration and look at some designs of solar and wood fired dehydrators that we have experimented with at Aprovecho.
These are just a partial list of the subjects we are most likely to cover. Other topics we may cover include, but are in no way limited to, solar desalination, alternative forms of refrigeration, refining of clay for ceramics and kiln building just to name a few. At Aprovecho we are always open to adjusting the subjects to meet an individual group’s needs and wants. As long as it is in the realm of AT we are open to fitting it into our schedule.
Click here to enroll online or by post.
Other Classes
Local Food Networks: Know your Food! or How to Become a Food Activist
In the Fall of 2008 Aprovecho went on a diet; for one month we ate and drank only foods (including salt and cooking oils) that were grown or gathered within a 100 mile radius of our campus. The diet was a delicious and inspiring success and in this class we will use the various lessons learned from the experience as starting points for a discussion of the possibilities and the challenges of eating locally. You will gain resources for how to plug into your own local food network as well as meal ideas for how to make best use of your local abundance.
Food Preservation: Make Best Use of the Harvest!
Processing and preserving your own food is an incredibly empowering way of engaging with the season´s harvest and alternative ways of feeding yourself and your family. In this hands-on workshop you will learn all the major methods of food preservation: dehydration, pickling, canning and freezing. You will become comfortable with recipes and methods that are easily reproducible in your kitchen at home. Some examples of potential activities for this class include: making fruit leather, canning tomatoes and other fruits, pickling beets as well as green beans and cucumbers, drying herbs, making pesto, pressing cider, and making yogurt.
Whole Foods Cooking and Nutrition
In this class we will cover the basics of how to cook whole foods to ensure maximum nutrition and easy digestion. Cooking for a community can be a challenge and this class will help students prepare wholesome and delicious food for our community at Aprovecho by covering cooking techniques, food combining, soaking, sprouting etc. We will also delve into some different perspectives on nutrition and take a look at the political, cultural and corporate influence of our standard American diets.
Wild Edibles and Food Foraging
This class will showcase the amazing diversity of wild edible plants from Aprovecho's forest. You will have the opportunity to touch, taste and smell and be inspired to incorporate more wild foods into your diet. You will also leave with some basic plant identification skills and wild-crafting principles and ethics.
Bread Baking
This class will cover bread baking techniques for sourdough and yeasted breads, taking you through all the steps including baking and eating!! You will also make sourdough starters that will be yours to use during the duration of the program.
Fermentation
Learn the science and joy of making your own fermented foods. We will cover the techniques and chemistry behind fermented vegetables, dairy, bread, alcohol and a variety of other tasty home made ferments. The class will include some samples, hands on demonstrations and recipes to inspire you on the road to fermentation.
Seaweed / Salt
Explore the Oregon coast and find edibles to supplement our diet. Learn about edible seaweed, salt processing, and nutrient cycles. Use a rocket stove to boil down salt from the sea.
Medicinal Herbs
In this seminar we will learn to identify and use a variety of medicinal herbs in the garden and forest while discovering why using plants as medicine is both safe and effective. The seminar will cover basic terms and preparations to lay some foundation principals of herbalism. We will also be making some plant medicines to take home.
Seed Saving
Local food security begins with local seed production. Varieties that are time-tested and adapted to your watershed provide a wide array of benefits, both as a gardener and consumer. In this seminar, you will learn about some of the issues facing seed production in modern agriculture, simple techniques for beginning your own seed collections from your garden, and some ideas about organizing around this issue in your area.
Click here to enroll online or by post.