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Welcome to Dark Times Academy!
These are hard times for those of us who love learning for the joy of learning and teaching for the joy of teaching. Dark Times Academy aims to offer a bright spot in all of this darkness–a place for affordable learning of the liberal and useful arts. A place where students can explore the world…
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MEDIA RELEASE: New courses from Dark Times Academy to focus on climate action, practical activism, and creating vision
AUCKLAND, 15 August 2025 – Dark Times Academy’s final lineup of courses for 2025, launching in mid-September, will focus on taking action on climate, learning about practical activism, and creating visions for the future. Dark Times Academy co-founder Mandy Henk says participants will be inspired by and learn from a stellar list of globally renowned…
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Direct Action! Education for Resistance and Rebellion
Direct action gets the job done! From climate to immigration, activists have been freeing us all through vigorous challenges to power. This class will bring together activists and experts from across a range of issues to talk about their experiences planning and carrying out a range of actions, from climate action in Aotearoa to nonviolent…
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Vision: Imagining the Future
How can we let go of the world as it is to bring about the world we want? To build the future of our dreams, we must first imagine it. But how can we do the work of letting go of what is to explore what might be? And how can we work together to…
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Making Hope: Climate Action for Dark Times
More than just the climate is changing in the world today. Governments are falling one by one to fascism and far-right political parties. With them comes an institutionalisation of doubt, denial, and a turn away from collective solutions to our shared problems. This class will explore the impacts of that transition and what we can…
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How to fight Trump’s cyber dystopia with community, self-determination, care and truth
A presentation to the Asia Pacific Media Network by Mandy Henk, co-founder and director of Dark Times Academy. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ When the US Embassy knocked on my door in late 2024, I was both pleased and more than a little suspicious. I’d worked with them before, but the organisation where I did…
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MEDIA RELEASE: New online course from Dark Times Academy set to take on the Tech Bros with an all-star guest speaker line-up
Other new courses to address Christian Nationalism and ‘Decomputing’ AUCKLAND, 16 April 2025 – Community education provider Dark Times Academy has announced some bold new courses for its second term lineup for 2025, with topics covering the threat of Christian Nationalism, ‘decomputing’, and a special course about resisting the Silicon Valley ‘tech bros’ and oligarchs,…
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Decomputing: A Community Exploration
Register here. How this course works Taking inspiration from the long history around the world of folk education, particularly the Scandinavian and Appalachian traditions, this course is designed to offer a fun, affordable and rigorous experience–that serves the needs of working adults. Like all folk education, liberation and movement building is at the core of…
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Unmasking Theocracy: Project 2025 and the Christian Nationalist Agenda
Register here How this course works Taking inspiration from the long history around the world of folk education, particularly the Scandinavian and Appalachian traditions, this course is designed to offer a fun, affordable and rigorous experience–that serves the needs of working adults. Like all folk education, liberation and movement building is at the core of…
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Fighting the Broligarchy
Register here How this course works Taking inspiration from the long history around the world of folk education, particularly the Scandinavian and Appalachian traditions, this course is designed to offer a fun, affordable and rigorous experience–that serves the needs of working adults. Like all folk education, liberation and movement building is at the core of…
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NZ education provider has US Embassy grant terminated after refusing to provide course material for alignment with new US government policies
AUCKLAND, 19 February 2025 – New Zealand-based community education provider Dark Times Academy has had a US Embassy grant it received to deliver a course teaching Pacific Island-based journalists about disinformation terminated after the new US administration requested a list of course participants and to review the programme material. The course, called ‘A Bit Sus’,…
