The following are thoughts about challenges I encountered during working on the survey and some suggestions for the future.

• Behind Schedule

I know that I am far behind the schedule that I have agreed to follow in providing this output. Already the next output has been due on March 1st of this year. I am working to catch up and come into line with the expected time line. If there is a possibility to re-negotiate the output schedule, I would like to make some suggestions. For that purpose I include a new schedule of when I plan to submit this as well as the following four outputs.

• Action Learning

During working on the survey I realized that so far I have been working mostly on the informational aspects of this project, spending lots of time on the computer, gathering information and putting it into some order and layout. The actually stage of doing has not quite arrived, although it is getting closer and I am looking forward to that.
The response time for having an output peer-reviewed by at least one member of the Action Learning Group (ALG) needs to be taken into account and has the potential to cause delays in delivery.
It appears to be quite challenging if the members of the ALG are in vastly opposite time zones and their projects are of quite different nature. It could be of benefit, but it would require extra effort. I am disappointed that it was not possible to keep the ALG. After a great start it more or less came to a hopefully only temporary halt.
Personal and technical challenges for some of our group members make it quite difficult to stay in touch.
Also I would like a much more frequent meeting schedule, even so it is putting more strain on scheduling.
There is much more work to do then I can cover in one year. I have the advantage that I know this property very well and have been thinking about redesigning it for a while and have gathered diverse notes, info, etc. already.
The set advising sessions are not quite as useful as I would have hoped. The four questions somehow seem not to get to the core issues where I need help with, keeping within schedule, identifying ecosocial design learning needs and more, which is hard to verbalize. I realize that it is my responsibility to make these sessions worthwhile, so I will work on that. The sessions have been helpful in re-focusing and putting into words what is going on. I am wondering if adding coaching techniques to these session would be helpful in addressing issues in a more direct way.
My actual learning so far has more to do with how to put outputs together then on my project of urban sustainable living. The type of design skills I have been learning have been limited to output production, organizing myself and time management.

• Extending the program duration

From what I see now of the amount of work I really would like to invest in this program it seems to me that I could easily extend it into a two year program. If there is a possibility to do so I am quite interested. I do hope that I can extend the program for a few months, although I will try to catch up. An extension would allow during the implementation phase to focus on actually implementing, and avoiding less focusing on creating outputs for the program.

• Growing season

The timing of the opening and closing workshops, the graduation and the spacing of the outputs, specially for land based projects is right at the prime time for outside work, at least where this project is located. Here during May to September is the growing season and preparation work starts even earlier as well as harvesting season goes into October.

• 7 Outputs

Actually there is a seventh output, which is the portfolio presentation at the concluding workshop of this program.

• Amount of work needed

It would be helpful to mention in the future that the amount of work required and time needed is more then it might look like. My misjudgment is partly the reason that I am struggling to keep up with the schedule for the outputs. I am sure it is going to vary a lot, but for the quality I'd like to achieve, I think I am spending about 20 hours a week on this project. I have not read the output guidelines yet, but assume that they might give a good picture of the effort required. And then there is the somewhat challenging evaluation form that takes time.

• Mind Maps and Design Cycle

I want to mention one day of utter confusion and frustration I went through. When I started out working on my outputs, after the career review, I used a mind map to gather an overview for the whole project. Then I started working on the survey and found that I had a hard time distinguishing between the survey and the rest of the design phases, especially when looking at the survey of the survey, etc. I could not really use the mind map as I had developed it, because it is a representation of the whole project, not only the survey. Another aspect was that some of the pieces in the output are listed under output at the end of the different phases, but are created throughout the duration of the project. I got so confused what is part of the survey for the whole project, what is the survey of the survey and the other survey phases that I had to stop for hours, actually a whole day. Then I sat down and made another small mind map only for the survey, which helped.
It is also kind of not working the way I thought of the survey. Lets say I know from the client they want to renew their driveway. Now, I am looking at that, thinking ok, I will need to find out all the information about the legal zoning situation, what materials are possible to use, what is the possible timeframe, what are possible contractors, etc. In the analysis and design phase I would then select the material, contractors, define the costs, etc. In reality, this is going to happen all at once. I can't see myself having the time to do the research of all the possible choices. This overlapping and intertwined process is not very well representable with mind maps.

• The real reason for the delay - me!

The real reason for any delay in delivering my outputs in time has to do with two things. First my initial complacency and initial resistance to get started right away after the introductory residential intensive and secondly by my misjudgment of how much time it will take me to document what I am doing, bringing to consciousness the processes I am going through and the material there is to cover.
I did not really start on the outputs, including the career review, before December and at a leisurely pace.
A further factor is hat I underestimated the demand on my time I will need to work for income. In January and February I had to work about double the time than I had planned for. I felt this was necessary to give my clients the service they deserve and retain their patronage.
I also know from the past, that I am very capable to push myself beyond any considerations of my own health to make things happen. Specially for this program I do not want to do this, as I think it is contrary to the vision Gaia University has. Disregarding personal factors such as emotional, psychological and physical well being is in essence quite unsustainable and not appropriate in how we need to organize our future.
I remember mentioning in May 2006 in Tennessee, after going through the first ROG (Regional Organizing Group) program I attended that I could see the work requirement for the Information Systems for Gaia University be such that I might not be able to complete the degree program in a year's time. Well, I hope that I did not setup myself up in way of a self fulfilling prophecy. I plan to catch up.

• Conclusion

I think it would be optimal to negotiate the time an output takes from output to output, including how much that would cost, the time schedule, what support I will need, etc. This would allow for breaks if necessary and of course could take shorter or longer than a year and could be customized to individually different and changing situations and location of the project. The final workshop and project presentation could be offered maybe twice a year in different locations and at different times.