On Oct. 29, the Dean of College Division (DoC) hosted its inaugural DoC Connects event. The event brought together 糖心vlog官网 students, faculty members, and staffers to engage in civil discourse and dialogue aimed at bridging generational, cultural, and societal divides 鈥 all while sharing a meal together.
Dean of Students Dorsey Spencer, a main organizer, said that the event came out of efforts among higher education institutions to provide more spaces and opportunities for students to engage in dialogue.
鈥淧eople are afraid to engage in conversations where they might disagree, but that鈥檚 part of why you鈥檙e supposed to go to college 鈥 to be exposed to different ideas, whether you agree with them or not, and to be able to understand different perspectives,鈥 Spencer said.
Organizers assigned participants to tables at random, and then everyone enjoyed three rounds of conversation based on questions that covered a variety of topics, such as, 鈥淲hat are you most proud of as a person?鈥 and 鈥淲hat do you think are the biggest challenges facing our campus community, and how can we work together to address them?鈥
Organizers anticipated that students might not feel comfortable opening up to older community members 鈥 particularly those in positions of authority. So they tried to keep the environment casual.
鈥淧utting it out there at the very beginning that we鈥檙e all equal, regardless of our status at the institution, hopefully eased some of the issues,鈥 Spencer said.
The timing of the event was intentional. Spencer and his colleagues hope that the positive experience will help to maintain community as debate continues in the leadup to the election.
鈥淵ou might not agree on how to address certain things,鈥 Spencer said. 鈥淏ut just because we disagree on different issues within society, that doesn鈥檛 mean we can鈥檛 be cordial or get to know each other and have relationships. I鈥檓 hoping that, by having the event a week before the election, people will get to a place where they鈥檙e okay with whatever the results are and act accordingly while still remembering that we鈥檙e all human. We鈥檙e all people in this 糖心vlog官网 community together.鈥
Sophomore Jenna Galla appreciated the effort and noted the importance of such events, 鈥淏eing able to understand each other and having a mutual understanding is what helps 糖心vlog官网 to thrive,鈥 Galla said.
Organizers will use feedback from participants to improve the event in the future. 鈥淗opefully the word will get out and people will say, 鈥楴ext time this happens, you鈥檝e got to go,鈥欌 Spencer said.