Georgics Local
Monticello College now offers workshops in your local area to help your family and community to develop a 5-mile radius Food Security Zone (FSZ).
Over the course of a year, three separate and distinct 8-hour workshops will be offered in various areas in Idaho and Utah to teach:
- 90-Day Composting
- Bio Char Production
- Soil Regeneration
- Year Round Food Production
- Food Preservation
- Landrace Seed Procurement
- Cold Climate Natural Beekeeping
- 18-hour Sourdough Bread Production
- In-Ground and Root Cellar Food Storage
Each class is stand alone and is paid for separately.
Class Two – September
8:00am – 10:00am: Year Round Food Production – Classroom Lecture One (scheduling, what to plant in each season, how much to plant, winter harvesting)
10:00am – 10:15am: Break
10:15am – 12:30pm: Year Round Food Production – Hands-on Workshop (planting methods, tools, production wisdom, harvesting)
12:30pm – 1:30pm: Lunch
1:30pm – 3:00pm: Cold Climate Natural Beekeeping – Classroom Lecture Two (natural beekeeping philosophy, science and practice, cold climate hives, be at one with your bees, swarms/splits, beelining, honey harvest, breaking pest cycles)
3:00pm – 3:15pm: Break
3:15pm – 4:30pm: Land Race Seed Procurement – Classroom Lecture Three (Promiscuous pollination, the myth of heirlooms, open pollination, the science of landrace vegetables, the legacy of seed saving)
4:30pm – 5:00pm: Summary and Q&A
Schedule of Events
September 18, 2023
Richfield, UT
Host: Shyannne Hathaway
September 19, 2023
Pleasant Grove, UT
Host: McKenna Gordon
September 20, 2023
Payson, UT
Host: Rachell Ashby
September 21, 2023
Pocatello, ID
Host: Dr. Jennifer Blake
September 23, 2023
Vernal, UT
Host: Heather Speth
Dr. Brooks’ soil class was amazing! Probably one of the most productive days of our summer. He is a great presenter – so articulate, knowledgeable, widely read and engaging. He never lost our interest once – and that’s saying a lot for 8 hours of talking about dirt. It completely changed our paradigms about gardening and the incredible hidden universe underground. Gardening is so much easier and productive than we imagined! Thanks Dr. Brooks! We will definitely be returning for more, and hopefully visiting the campus soon!
Program Cost:
The cost is $95 per participant per class – three classes in the year, no discounts for family or children.
There are no refunds available, be sure this is what you want to do. You may send someone in your place if you can’t attend.
Bring your own food to cover lunch.
Bring snacks, water, a hat and gloves, and of course something to take notes.
As this is a serious educational venture and impacts your future food security, Do Not bring children. Infants (not walking) are allowed.
What is Georgics?
*For the Western world, the foundation of critical thinking was conceived during a time when farming was king. It was known to the ancients as georgics. Georgics, more commonly known since the 1800s as the philosophy of agrarianism, is a term that describes a culture of independent farming that engenders the qualities of duty, order, frugality, and self-control. These farming-oriented values and ethics are the same ones that create and sustain a liberal arts system of education and a political order in which citizens govern rather than being ruled by the so-called 1%ers.
The word “georgic” or “georgics” is derived from both Latin and Greek, and literally means to work the land or to engage in agricultural efforts. When I say that in the 21st century, people generally think I am suggesting that everyone should engage the profession of farming, but that is not what I am saying. I mean to say that even while a person may be a doctor, a lawyer, a bricklayer, or a salesman; we should all still engage in farming to produce food and creating a rural lifestyle.
Georgics as a concept has a strong 2,700-year history. It begins with Hesiod around 700 BC. The Roman historian Virgil picked up the torch in his poetic writings actually called “The Georgics” in 35 BC. Hilaire Belloc illuminated economic medieval history in his work The Servile State, which outlines the evolution of the term “yeoman” from servant of the king to free landholder and independent farmer from 500 to 1400 AD. Georgics as an Anglo New World concept and practice, started in 1607 with Jamestown as agriculture and georgics became the primary means of livelihood and way of thinking for the American
colonists. By the late 17th century John Locke introduced his georgic concepts of private land ownership with “Two Treatises on Government,” followed by the mid to late 18th century economic theories of the Physiocrats in Europe, which supported the growth and development of agriculture as the true means of national wealth. Early 20th century Austrian philosopher, Rudolf Steiner, the founder of the Waldorf Schools, developed the georgic concept of biodynamics in the 1920s, which was then introduced to American farmers in the 1930s, followed by the georgic concepts of permaculture presented by Bill Mollison in 1978 (chapter four covers both biodynamics and permaculture in depth).
The term georgics was adopted by the early Americans to describe a quality they not only very much admired, but one that they were determined to inculcate into the new American culture and that they were convinced would create a great land of liberty.
