The Welcome Table
Team Members: Michael Bobby, Kristin Cuilla, Mark Edington, Amanda Lawrence, Barbara Melvin, Arnold Singleton, Mike Stebbins, Catherine Templeton
We have seen, through our short time together, the benefit of shared conversation and discovery in our small groups. Each encounter has resulted in coordinated ideas and connectivity around a myriad of causes about which we are passionate. Additionally, we are unified in our desire to expand our intimate circle to include other perspectives, cultures, and ideas.
To capture this energy and to leverage the existing group of like-minded colleagues, our project proposal brings our Low Country class together in small dinner groups for fellowship and organic conversation. While each dinner will start with introductions and an ice breaker, any topics for discussion will grow out of the interests and activities of the dinner guests. Like the points of leverage identified in our own group, it is our hope that this project will bring people and resources together synergistically in a way that cannot be replicated outside of an intimate setting dedicated to moving relationships and projects forward.
Although our current DLI class is diverse, we are homogeneous in our desire to be inclusive. We would like to use this project to go beyond the very short and structured time we have together to further edify our class relationships and bring others in from the community to expand our network.
As a result, we are proposing a “Welcome Table” hosted by members of Team 3 for the first few months of 2016. Each dinner will be hosted by members of our project group and will have whatever theme and setting the host chooses. Below is the schedule for our four “Welcome Table” events. We encourage the entire Low Country DLI class to sign up for a date a plan to bring a guest. We don’t place restrictions on the guest. You are welcome to bring a friend, spouse, significant other, etc. It is our hope that the atmosphere and discussions that ensue at these events will spur those that come to carry on the idea and open their home to another group.