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"​Wisdom is like a baobab tree; no one individual can embrace it."

- Ghanaian Proverb

SAVI

OurSpace World’s pilot cooperative makerspace community
The forthcoming Sovereign Activist Village*Incubator (SAVI) will be a makerspace and training grounds for new and existing cooperative efforts for people who face systematic discrimination. Interns and fellows (“stewards”), community volunteers (“activists”), and trainees (“members”) from local, regional, and national networks cooperatively manage this space. Anchored by a community-facing cooperative educational farm that will supply SAVI stakeholders with fresh produce, and a community-based natural-building crew (“Each1Teach1” - similar to the Habitat for Humanity model), SAVI will be a self-sustaining initiative that will serve as a model for other communities seeking a holistic transition to a regenerative economy.
Engaging with SAVI
There are several levels through which people can engage with SAVI:​
Activist
Stewardship
Membership
SAVI’s Goals
SAVI will facilitate a fully-developed Teach 22 training infrastructure, complete with several partner training farms in addition to the on-site community farm, a yurt village for hands-on cooperative education, farm-based childcare programming, rolling immersive skills-building experiences, and an electronic tool and jobs database (Rural JobLink). This Rural JobLink database will facilitate the continual identification, matching, and training of systematically disadvantaged people who have lost work due to the economic crisis exacerbated by COVID-19, linking them to a network of small-scale farming and building projects. This will:
  • create jobs and training programs through the pooling of part-time opportunities in agricultural business
  • create a pool of green justice workers who will have a direct impact on protecting rural land, slowing the effects of climate change, and reversing the impact that extractive economic activities have had on the land
Teach22 Training Paradigm
Cooperative education elements are infused into everything we do. The Ujima Initiative (TUI) focuses on formal cooperative education including business management, finances, operating agreements, and how to navigate future challenges. SAVI needs wise stewards, and Teach22 pushes them to develop skillful hands and minds right now. Much like a language immersion course, activists begin farming and building the moment they step on site at SAVI. Every lesson is experiential. Our goal is to have activists and stewards:
  • practice and physically embody hands-on skills 
  • experience work as a cooperative village striving for sovereignty
  • actively learn through highly transferable experiences
Sustainable Sustenance Farming Training 
Activists and stewards are immersed in experiential farm training from the first day at SAVI. We fold them into daily farm tasks immediately, only delivering the basic didactic information necessary in the moment to have folks understand what they are doing. They quickly grasp farming in general, and the specifics of the farm projects at SAVI designed to feed and support SAVI stakeholders. From here, SAVI Members engage new activists and stewards in farming education circles. There, activists and stewards study the inter-related dynamics of land, growing, and food, while strategizing how to implement wise farming practices that are in alignment with sustainability and land regeneration.

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Basic Farm Building Training
When training and educating a builder, we find that it is helpful to intersperse demonstration, hands-on practice, and technical explanation in a 2:3:1 ratio. 
Demonstration - Building is a “team sport”. Activists and stewards are the extra set of hands to hold a post while it is being anchored, or the extra set of eyes on the level while a door header is being hung. They get to be an active participant in the process while they watch and learn as a task is being completed.
Hands-on Practice - We highlight the word “practice” because the groundwork to mastering a skill lies in allowing the aspiring builder to repeat the task themselves in a low-pressure environment. Basically, we give activists the freedom to fail, and the chance to learn from those mistakes. We aim to keep our structures simple and low-cost to eliminate technical and economic barriers to those who want to build.
Technical Explanation - “You’ve seen it done. You did it yourself. Now we will tell you why you did it!” Linking the previously embodied training to mental frameworks solidifies that particular knowledge and understanding “plank”. Activist builders can now stand on that plank to reach back and teach others, or build additional skills and knowledge through practice on this new foundation.
Building Curriculum - SAVI builders move through the following stages to strengthen their basic skills: