I agree that this would help address some of the downsides of an IF. I have heard that pairing programming together (e.g., a fellowship discussion followed by a mealtime social) would be optimal and based on my personal experience with student communities outside of EA, that rings true.
Unfortunately, I have yet to implement that in UChicago EA, but I would be interested to see if that improves engagement among IF fellows!
One concern I have would be that these socials wouldn’t be mandatory, and so you may be selecting out promising EAs who just haven’t built enough rapport yet. It would be great to be able to combine deep un/structured engagement in a ‘mandatory’ setting.
True—I wonder if two things that might address that are
Explicitly inviting people (especially those who may not be as connected) to the social and having organizers be warm and attentive (in general I find that explicit encouragement / invitation is quite powerful!)
Ending the mandatory session with either something fun and social, or deep and personal/reflective (appropriate to context and the conversation that’s just happened), which could both transition it to social and be engineered to help the intellectual notes be integrated into one’s worldview.
Thanks for sharing this, Chana! In the initial draft post, I had included some smaller changes to the Intro Fellowship, one of which was to host all sessions as dinner parties in an effort to draw out these late-night convos—so I’m really excited this is something you’re thinking about. +1 on both of your interventions above.
I’d also add that I think there are two types of 1-on-1s I do with fellows: the first is the classic career 1-on-1 where I try to connect people with useful resources / opportunities to speed them along in their EA journey. The second is just to get to know them as a human being, knowing that if I build personal rapport, they will likely stick around the EA community and be exposed to even more things. I think more organizers should generally try the second type of 1-on-1 more! (sometimes I tell the fellow we have two options and ask them what they would find most useful use of their time)
I suspect that for all the but the most gung-ho people, the second should come before the first, or take up the first half of the meeting. I remember doing community building for the Jewish community in college and people started to find some of the overweening helpfulness off-putting. (But organizers may just be better at it than I was)
I agree that this would help address some of the downsides of an IF. I have heard that pairing programming together (e.g., a fellowship discussion followed by a mealtime social) would be optimal and based on my personal experience with student communities outside of EA, that rings true.
Unfortunately, I have yet to implement that in UChicago EA, but I would be interested to see if that improves engagement among IF fellows!
One concern I have would be that these socials wouldn’t be mandatory, and so you may be selecting out promising EAs who just haven’t built enough rapport yet. It would be great to be able to combine deep un/structured engagement in a ‘mandatory’ setting.
True—I wonder if two things that might address that are
Explicitly inviting people (especially those who may not be as connected) to the social and having organizers be warm and attentive (in general I find that explicit encouragement / invitation is quite powerful!)
Ending the mandatory session with either something fun and social, or deep and personal/reflective (appropriate to context and the conversation that’s just happened), which could both transition it to social and be engineered to help the intellectual notes be integrated into one’s worldview.
Thanks for sharing this, Chana! In the initial draft post, I had included some smaller changes to the Intro Fellowship, one of which was to host all sessions as dinner parties in an effort to draw out these late-night convos—so I’m really excited this is something you’re thinking about. +1 on both of your interventions above.
I’d also add that I think there are two types of 1-on-1s I do with fellows: the first is the classic career 1-on-1 where I try to connect people with useful resources / opportunities to speed them along in their EA journey. The second is just to get to know them as a human being, knowing that if I build personal rapport, they will likely stick around the EA community and be exposed to even more things. I think more organizers should generally try the second type of 1-on-1 more! (sometimes I tell the fellow we have two options and ask them what they would find most useful use of their time)
I suspect that for all the but the most gung-ho people, the second should come before the first, or take up the first half of the meeting. I remember doing community building for the Jewish community in college and people started to find some of the overweening helpfulness off-putting. (But organizers may just be better at it than I was)