GRP13 - Open Badges / ICAAFs project

 

We aim to develop and strengthen a decentralised accreditation system which empowers learning providers, permaculturists, farmers, and ecosystem restoration practitioners, and the regenerative field as a whole to issue credentials in the form of ‘open badges’; while also operating as a unifying network for regenerative education.

These badges can replace academic credentials, quality certifications such as ‘Organic’ or ‘Fairtrade’,  attendance certificates for events, and create entirely new streams such as greater recognition of experiential learning, better recognition of indigenous learning practices, and new monitoring and evaluation processes for land or social/community permaculture projects.

One of the most exciting potential outcomes of the iCAAFS project is the ability for learners to carry over credentials from within the iCAAFS ecosystem of un/learning providers in order to build up to ‘Diploma’, or “Degree’ milestone badges which recognise the lifelong learning pathway of an individual and/or community. This objective requires the commitment of a number of key partners, but we intend to test a prototype milestone qualification by the end of this project lifecycle.

iCAAFS is firmly rooted in permaculture ethics, regenerative practices as well as an intention to embrace indigenous and decolonial forms of un/learning and knowing.

iCAAFS is at present developed to a minimum viable prototype which includes basic documentation of philosophy and use, prototype badges design, platform use, basic business plan, and testing of technology needed to implement.

We are now rolling out iCAAFS to stakeholders representing the most diverse use cases we can imagine in order to test its limitations and discover new possibilities; as well as co-design the detailed documentation and strategy with the end users. We are also developing and launching an iCAAFS onboarding course in order to streamline the un/learning process for new badge designers and issuers.

We intend to set up an advisory board of indigenous and decolonial leaders to inform the direction and philosophy of the iCAAFS project. Partners, badge issuers, and un/learning providers will be invited to participate, create autonomous working groups, and propose designs/projects for iCAAFS for the long term direction. In order to do this we need to co-create a functional participatory organisational design and governance. 


 

1. Complete enrollment of 2-5 case study partners in the iCAAFS program who represent diverse use-cases and scope by May 2024.
2. Finalise and launch onboarding training course by March 2024. Obtain Feedback from case-study partners by May 2024.
3. Develop Onboarding Webinar content which will be used to attract and sign up new users to the iCAAFS course by May 2024, and through the course, enrol them as users of the iCAAFS platform by Oct 2024.
4. Create accessible templates for onboarding with badge templates (graphical), metadata templates, and badge design templates (conceptual) by July 2024.
5. Test and revise business plan in May and November 2024.
6. Continue to work on funding strategy for iCAAFS as a whole, identify grant/fund opportunities outside of Next Steps and evaluate relevance to goals and objectives by May 2024. Add to this as needed. Apply for relevant funds throughout the year.
7. Together with initial regenerative education leaders, create a set of governance working group goals and guidelines for attracting members. Formalise a small starting governance team by Oct. 2024 and have regular (monthly?) checkins.
8. Develop and launch the iCAAFS website as independent from Gaia U with respective sales and landing pages for various offerings by Dec 2024. 


 

Siobhan Vida Ashmole, Andrew Langford

Reporting Officer: Siobhan Vida Ashmole