Online Diplomas: Integrated CC Adaptation, Disaster Risk Reduction & Development sl

Dear Idealist Colleagues

Join students from all over the world for an intensive series of courses in two online diploma programs.

Complete diploma information and course syllabi:

**OL 340: Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change**

**OL 440: Integrated Community Based Adaptation, Disaster Risk Reduction & Rural Development**

These courses begin by introducing basic climate change concepts and participatory disaster preparedness—and develop as participants identify local community vulnerabilities, identify risks and hazards, investigate appropriate solutions, design, launch and manage projects..

Online course participants are using our courses to develop real, on-the-ground projects with real communities—both individually and through North/South student partnerships. People from 146 different countries and over 475 organizations have used CSDi online courses to develop projects that have used 270 different kinds of project activities impacting over 300,000 community members.

The courses use the flexibility of online delivery to help you learn through case studies, field assignments with communities, and group discussions with fellow students—providing a complete learning environment. You will share experiences with fellow participants working in the field.

STEP 1: Diploma 340: Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change Four Foundation Courses. Begin with the first course: OL 341

OL 341. Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change 1: Designing & Funding Community-Based Adaptation Projects. Gain an insight into contemporary methods of developing community based, sustainable, impact-oriented projects. Gain practical field tools and develop a range of skills: facilitating participatory needs assessments and DRR assessments, designing projects, and researching evidence-based activities. Develop a real project in real time.

OL 342. Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change 2: Planning for Impact. Imbed impact into your adaptation project design with a powerful set of management tools. Log frames, detailed budgets, timelines, compelling fact sheets, M&E plans, outcomes and impact. These tools will communicate to donors and stakeholders exactly what you are trying to accomplish and can be used for effective management of the project once funded.

OL 343. Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change 3: The Community Focus. What does climate change adaptation mean at the community level? What practical tools are available today for communities to use in adaptation and in DRR? Conduct a baseline survey including climate vulnerability, risk assessment, an adaptation capacity analysis, and gain an understanding of local knowledge of a changing climate and of coping strategies. For practitioners who wish to begin working now at the community level to successfully adapt to the challenges that face us.

OL 344. Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change 4: Sustainable Implementation. How do you launch and implement a community based adaptation/DRR project? The importance of community engagement and project co-management. Developing skill sets for your community to use in the adaptation process. Learning tools: monitoring & evaluation. Community empowerment during project hand-over. Sustainability, follow-up & mentoring.

STEP 2: To Continue with Diploma 440: Integrated Community Based Adaptation, Disaster Risk Reduction & Rural Development Choose Four Elective Courses. ]]OL 303. Food Security, Nutrition, and Home Gardens 1 OL 304. Food Security, Nutrition and Home Gardens 2 OL 224. Participatory M&E OL 345. Community Based Disaster Risk Assessment, Preparedness and Management OL 346. Small Island Developing States and Climate Change OL 326. Developing Livelihood Resilience in your CBA project. OL 332. Water Conservation and Management in your CBA project. OL 333. Climate Smart Agriculture for your CBA project. ]]

Who should participate? Course participants are of all different ages, genders and professions—and have included Northern and Southern staff from INGOs, field staff from in-country NGOs, donors, executive directors, students, scientists, consultants and people who would like to transition into development work. These are online courses that have a local, in-country field component. Northern participants who don't have community access are partnered with Southern participants that do have community access.

Join over 800 colleagues in our Development Community.

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Course Catalogue

Questions? Please contact us: Online.Learning@csd-i.org

Sincerely,

Tim Magee Executive Director Center for Sustainable Development Tim Magee is the author of author of A Field Guide to Community Based Adaptation published by Routeledge, Oxford, England.

The Center for Sustainable Development specializes in providing sound, evidence-based information, tools and training for humanitarian development professionals worldwide. CSDi is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Expanded Information on Training:

1. Online Training Venue. We will supply two levels of mentoring. Each week's assignment will be accompanied by a clear, professional example of what we want you to achieve that week. It is yours to use as a template for your assignment—and for developing future projects. We will also provide comments, suggestions and encouragement for each one of your assignments individually. We want you to develop high quality project components, and we also want you to understand the hows and whys.

The work load is typically two to four hours per week. There are no set 'class' times; you work on your own schedule during the week. Completed assignments are due each Monday.

2. List of 146 countries and territories where course members live and work: Afghanistan, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Australia, Austria , Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, British Virgin Islands, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, China, Columbia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Ethiopia , Fiji, Finland, France, Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guatemala, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Lao PDR, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Mali, Mauritius, Mexico, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Montserrat, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nepal, Netherlands, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Perú, Philippines , Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Reunion, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Samoa, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovakia, Solomon Islands, Somalia, Somaliland, South Africa, South Sudan, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Timor Leste, Togo, Trinidad & Tobago, Tristan da Cunha, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom , United States, Uruguay, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

Course participants are of all different ages, genders and professions—and include Northern and Southern staff from large INGOs, field staff from small in-country NGOs, donors, executive directors, African business owners with a conscience, students, scientists, consultants and people who would like to transition into development work.

3. There are two very exciting aspects of the course: One is that participants are using the course to design real projects with real communities on the ground. The second is the cross-hemisphere partnerships between participants. We have people living in big cities (without access to communities) in Australia, Spain, Canada, the US, Brazil, and Panama, partnering on projects with on-the-ground field staff (with access to communities) in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Tajikistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Kenya, Columbia, Peru, and Venezuela.

4. Project development: It is with a community's needs list developed in the course that participants begin designing sustainable, impact-oriented projects. From needs assessments sent to us by course members, we have been able to see the many common problems worldwide including:

Income generation, clean water, access to education, poor sanitation, gender equality, migration, lack of vocational skills, chronic diarrhea and malnutrition in small children, lack of roads to villages, marginalization, shelter, food shortages, illiteracy, environmental degradation, drought, lack of irrigation for agriculture, community revitalization, connecting producers to markets, adapting to climate change and overpopulation. See a complete list of 270 project themes.

5. The Courses also Provide the Following Resources Documents on course topics by contemporary experts. Books, posters and manuals available online for download. Internet development links organized by sector. Class forum for posting questions to your classmates. Access to tools and resources on the Center site that are only available to students and CSD members. There are no books to buy—all course materials can be linked to, or downloaded from the course site.