Thank you for being interested in the apprenticeship program at the Maine Primitive Skills School. With the success of the last four years and the growing community of skills practitioners, we want to make sure you know what you are getting into. First, the apprenticeship is an experience. This experience produces results equal to what you invest. The days can be tiring, exhilarating, riddled with mosquitoes, or filled with joy, but they are always real and there is always growth in one’s self. The hard skills and soft skills of our collective ancestry serve to increase your awareness, self-confidence, overall abilities and much more.
This is a place of explosive growth for those willing to invest themselves. Our product is our students and we want to be sure that we have folks in the program who are driven by a passion to reconnect with ancestral skills. Part of that experience is a commitment to learning through applying ones self beyond books and Internet videos. The chances are pretty good you will get blisters, poison ivy, maybe even Lyme disease. What you will also develop is the perspective of someone who knows their vision path and strengthens that part of them that seems to flounder in the modern construct. If you want to track, learn plants, increase your awareness, get fire off the landscape, or rediscover yourself outside the expectations and demands of your current situation, we invite you to take the next step in the process.
Only twelve people will be selected each year to ensure enough one on one time with the instructors and provide a rich enough community learning and sharing experience. Make no mistake, a large part of this schools vision is to train the trainers and cultivate wisdom keepers for the next generation. As a result we will only accept four residential apprentices and eight non-residential apprentices. If you have already attended a five day course or more than one weekend course, than you know what you are in for. If you haven’t, attending at least four days is a vital component to building an important mentoring foundation. Before beginning the apprenticeship we will schedule some quality face time.
We want you to be sure this program is for you as much as we want to be sure our community is investing wholly in someone who will develop their own skill sets and eventually share them. This usually means setting up a day where you can come to the school, meet the instructors, even experience a part of a class you have interest in and/or haven’t yet attended. For planning purposes we want to have the apprentices chosen by October 15th of this year, but the process deadline is March 15th of 2013. Our Apprenticeship Potluck will be at 7pm, Friday, March 22, 2013 here in Augusta.
The residential apprenticeship requires a financial contribution of $3,400. For the non-residential program the required contribution is $2,300. Residents may move in on April 15 and stay until October 15. Non-residents can stay up to three weeks at a time provided they are attending courses during each of those three weeks. In between class times they can work on their skills with the residential participants but must also share in the duties of community life. The general guideline is a minimum of two hours for each of the following: nurturing and maintaining your “sacred fire”, pursuit/development of your first passion, pursuit/development of your second passion, community time, and community maintenance (such as weeding the garden, stacking wood, dishes, etc.).
If this description didn’t scare you away than you know we’re doing all we can to preserve something sacred, and it would seem you are called on some level to cultivate these skills for yourself. If so, welcome. I look forward to pouring over your applications. Let me know if we can call you for a phone interview or follow up questions. Feel free to shoot any questions you have this way as well. The journey has already begun.