HMI’s Online Learning Series Getting Started Introduction to Holistic Management® course began in March 2016 with 33 participants from the United States, Canada, Ecuador, Columbia, Iceland, England, Belgium, Ireland, Russia and Australia. This course focused on key Holistic Management planning concepts and principles to help participants manage their farm/ranch for the triple bottom line (social, environmental, and financial sustainability) and more effectively manage resources. Participants were excited to learn how to improve their ability to observe, understand, and make decisions based on what they can control. Through these new skills participants now have the knowledge and tools to improve their ability to work with nature and to increase productivity.
Featured Participants
Joe Unger
“We will use the information gained from this course as we look at the whole picture before making decisions. We are more confident that we are making the best decision for our farm by using this framework. Now that we have a holistic goal we are able to keep on track with what we want to accomplish. We are looking forward to taking the additional online courses and believe that this will help us be better stewards of the land.”
Tim and Karen Stevenson
“We loved taking the “Getting Started to Holistic Management® Course”. It has given us tools and refined tools that we already had to make our place more ecology friendly and to help us understand our management system better. “
Patri
ck Jackson
“The Introduction to Holistic Management® course provided a method, served as the catalyst and equipped me with the knowledge to assist my family in starting the long-overdue process of holistic goal setting and farm planning.
We have already benefited from the enhanced communication required by the process and I’m confident that if we effectively apply the concepts of Holistic Management, we can ensure healthy land and a sustainable future.
I’ve already enrolled in my next HMI course and plan on participating in many more classes and events.”
Here’s the best things participant’s learned/experienced:
“An excellent course whether for farming, business outside of farming or life in general. A must-have in the tool-belt of life.”
“Very impressed and plan to participate in other courses.”
“I was very satisfied with the course. Larry did an excellent job and Julie was very helpful. Because of my experience with this course, I will enroll in more HMI classes.”
“I loved the course! I would love to take another one!”
“I would recommend it to anyone wanting to approach Holistic Management.”
“Very well organized and makes me want to find out more about Holistic Management”
“Very good foundation. Thorough and focused. The webinar and course platform (canvas & adobe) were easy to use and a helpful guide through the modules. Particularly liked that webinar option to speak or message without interruptions there was sense of connection with everyone, Larry was a great facilitator of the material and comments.”
“The most useful things throughout the whole course have been that there is a rational, understandable, logical approach to ranching. Love the concept of “wholes” as it explains a lot of things in life and ranching!”
“Looking at our farm as a whole rather than piecemeal. It seems invaluable to link this in with your holistic goal, therefore making sure we are always travelling in the right direction.”
“ [The]process of creating and documenting a holistic goal. the decision questions and process is also very helpful.”
“The course gave me mission critical questions to ask and a system to house the decision-making processes in which we engage.”
“To be conscious of the mineral cycle and to do formal a formal assessment of the land.”
“I have a better idea how to use the decision making framework.”
“Setting goals and learning a better understanding of the ecosystem!”
“Understanding the ecosystem as a whole!”
Based on the survey responses, here are the changes that occurred:
Getting Started Introduction to Holistic Management® Whole Farm/Ranch Planning Course Survey Results
| Knowledge/Behavior and Confidence Increase | % Increase |
| Your ability to define your management team after session | 100% |
| How to inventory your farms resources after session | 100% |
| Your ability to develop a whole farm goal after session | 97% |
| Your ability to identify needed systems and protocols to create a successful farm after session | 100% |
| Ability to integrate social, economic, and environmental factors into your decisions after session | 93% |
| Your ability to make complex on-farm or ranch decisions after session | 87% |
| Your ability to assess ecosystem health after session | 90% |
| Overall satisfaction with the instructor’s effectiveness | 100% |
Adelene is a resident of Arkansas and loves exploring the state’s natural trails. Her passion for education and technology led her to earn a master’s in learning systems technology from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. With her professional experience managing student/client databases and instructional design, Adelene will bring skill and understanding to her role as Office Manager & Instructional Designer at HMI. Her focus on making education more accessible to diverse communities is evident through her volunteer work as an board member for a scholarship program. Adelene is devoted to creating educational opportunities that align with HMI’s mission to promote healthy, resilient lands and thriving communities.
Seth Wilner has been a Holistic Management International Certified Educator since 2005. For 22 years he has worked as an agent educator with University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension where he specializes in farm business management with an emphasis on whole farm planning.
Dana was first introduced to Holistic Management in the 1990s while working in the Texas Hill Country. She strongly believes that Holistic Management can positively impact families that are on the land, the communities they are a part of, and larger landscape resource regeneration efforts.
Sarah Robertson grew up in Taos, New Mexico and has always been passionate about land stewardship, growing things, and nurturing others. After completing a BA in Communication from the University of New Mexico and working with local non-profits, she started her journey as a first-generation farmer. Since 2015, she has been learning and growing alongside her husband on various leased properties in Albuquerque, NM and running a small market farm with goats, chickens, and a CSA. In her role as Programs Assistant at HMI, Sarah brings her enthusiasm for regenerative agriculture, devotion to supporting others, and drive for lifelong learning and growing.
Jozua Lambrecht is from South Africa and divides his time between their home in Somerset West and their family farm in Sutherland, one of the coldest places in South Africa, where they farm with sheep. He is married to his wife Therese and they have two daughters.
Alejandro Carrillo is a fourth-generation rancher, and he is quite familiar with the challenges of running a profitable cattle ranch in the Chihuahuan desert. Because annual precipitation seldom exceeds nine inches, every drop counts when it comes to growing more grasses. Grazing year-round with only sea salt as an input, he is not willing to waste any water in such a brittle environment.
Jared L Talley was born and raised in Southwestern Idaho and now seeks to help rural communities adapt and thrive in a rapidly changing world. He is an Assistant Professor in the School of Public Service at Boise State University, earning his PhD in Philosophy from Michigan State University and his MPA in Environmental Policy and Natural Resource Management from Boise State University. An environmental philosopher by training and an interdisciplinary scholar in practice, he seeks to better understand how communities relate to the land and how this relationship poses obstacles and opportunities for collaboration and governance. In doing so, he studies the role of science in collaborative policy, the role of place in environmental identity, and the role of the imagination in mediating both. Specifically, he studies grazing management and public land permitting, community-led conservation programs, rural education and entrepreneurship, place-based environmental governance, and the imaginative experience of our natural and built environments — all in the contexts of the intermountain American West.
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