Invoking the Pause  (“ITP”) experienced spring a little early this year as we read through the applications from budding collaborations and seeds of creative solutions for climate change. We received 16 proposals this year, and from those we selected 5 grant partners that best fit the spirit of the "Pause" and show promising solutions to address some aspect of climate change. While we were unable to fund all of the worthy proposals that we received, we were heartened by each and every one of the efforts we read about.

This year’s cohort of grant partners include:

•    A team of activists making cross-cultural connections to spread permaculture and carbon farming techniques in Barbados;
•    An organization using satellite technology to stop illegal deforestation in the rainforests of Indonesia, the Amazon and parts of Africa;
•    A team of organizers & linguists seeking to create new language to express the losses caused by climate change;
•    A group of experts from diverse backgrounds exploring new ways to share stories and communications dealing with climate change; and
•    A design team that will take a Pause to explore ideas about “The Future of Work” and how our work lives may be altered in the future due to the effects of climate change.

We are honored to help steward each of their efforts.  We welcome them to the ITP Community with excitement for the fruit that their work will bear in the months ahead!

2015 Grant Partners:

1.    Rainforest Connection 

Rainforest Connection will use their Pause to convene a small team in Yosemite to review the past year, discuss lessons learned, and plan a development strategy for the next few years. Their pilot programs and feasibility tests on using satellite technology and recycled cell phones to monitor illegal deforestation are generating an enormous amount of information and raw data, but they have not had the time to properly digest it all due to the pace of development. The Pause would convene two key collaborators for the first week, before inviting advisors, board members, key staff and partners to join them for a series of open conversations envisioning the future of their work.

2.     Human Impacts Institute

This Pause will bring together a diverse group of policy, education, arts, and storytelling experts to develop short-term outreach programs in conjunction with the December UN Conference of the Parties (COP), and strategize on how to carry this work forward effectively beyond 2015. During the Pause, these specialists will review the already-successful Creative Climate Communication programs of the Human Impacts Institute and to connect them to the local community of Paris, France, where the largest climate policy negotiation of our time is taking place this December.

3.    Earthseed Consulting

Earthseed, in collaboration with the Black Permaculture Network, will use a Pause grant to travel to Barbados and Jamaica to connect with existing partner Green Business Barbados and offer an Introduction to Permaculture and Carbon Farming techniques workshop. The trip will end in Jamaica with a 2-day strategic planning retreat that will inform Earthseed’s mission of how to engage the next generation of diverse leaders with resources aimed at transforming their conditions from the ground up.

4.     Bureau of Linguistic Reality


This Pause will bring together three activist-organizers and a linguist for three weeks surrounding the Paris COP where they will create a “cultural intervention initiative” called The Bureau of Linguistic Reality, aimed at developing new language to express the losses that result from climate change. They will also facilitate much-needed Pauses for COP attendees, providing the opportunity to introduce and hone creative tactics for shifting cultures, which they can then take back to their respective countries.

5.     CoClimate


The Pause will allow the CoClimate team a rare opportunity to come together in the same location and explore ideas for their emerging project “The Future of Work,” which explores how our daily work lives may be drastically altered by climate change. They will use the experience of the Pause to inform the design of the materials they use to communicate with the public through this project.

In addition, it is our pleasure to continue fertile relationships with former Grant Partners to help take them to the next level.  Our Seeding Possibilities Grant recipients thus far are: As You Sow and Tribal Changes App.  Read about their exciting projects to date on this site. 

We intend to keep you posted on the progress of all Grant Partners, present and past, over the course of the year and join us in congratulating all on their impactful work.