Posted by Arlene on October 27, 1999 at 17:04:22:
In Reply to: Effective FIND Workshops as opposed to the past spring Workshops posted by Ethelynn Intatano on October 14, 1999 at 13:42:52:
As a recent DVI alumni and huge advocate of FIND, I’m extremely happy to see that the Dialogues and Conferences are still arousing interest, questions, and emotions. There’s hope that FIND will live on yet! In response to the posts concerning FIND workshops, I would like to say that FIND does not necessarily need STUDENT facilitators, but rather QUALITY facilitators. For example, Sonia Aranza is a working mother, but she is also an enthusiastic, mind-provoking speaker who definitely knows how to connect with her audience whether they are college students or not. Should she not be invited to speak at FIND because she is “older?” Also just because you have a student facilitator does not mean that you will have a quality workshop experience. For example, at Drexel, my facilitator could not carry the conversation and actually walked out half way through the session! She was completely clueless and it was a waste of my time. My point is that delegates need to open their minds in order learn from everyone, young or old, but I do agree that FIND must work harder to find quality speakers.
Secondly, as for the structure of the Dialogues and Conferences, I too miss the old days when workshops were more intimate, but realistically the possibility of those days becoming reality again are quite slim. FIND has just grown too large and the ratio of delegates to facilitators, unfortunately, cannot be diminished unless FIND starts putting lower caps on attendance.
Thirdly, I am curious to know what you believe “the purpose and message of FIND” is and how you would effectively impress this message to the delegates because everyone has a different perspective as to “what FIND should do for me.” I’ve been involved in planning a conference and I know it’s very hard to please every delegate. Some come to hear about dee-jaying while others come to learn about political issues in the Fil-Am community. And that is why some FIND’s discuss the Filipino community on a whole while others focus on just the college-age Filipino Americans. Each conference has a different message, perhaps you didn’t get the message Harvard was trying to send out or maybe you just didn’t hear the message you wanted to hear.
Thirdly, you made two very unfair assumptions that I would like to clear up.
“Well, since we are getting so-and-so, and he/she IS very prominent and going to speak at OUR FIND, then this FIND will be the best this year" and “the whole conference could HAVE been, if only the delegates were the main target.” Planning a FIND conference is a very arduous process that takes 11 months to iron out all the details. The reason that most people get involved in FIND is because they want it to grow and they want to enhance the delegate’s experience, NOT to get props. And it’s very unfair to negate someone’s hard work with an assumption like that.
In conclusion, I’d like to challenge all of you to have your voice heard. If you’re not happy with the way FIND is going send your input to the SC. Tell them you want more hands-on experiences and be specific: Do you define “hands-on” as being able to discuss with the speaker or performing an activity as a group? It’ll only lead to better conferences and dialogues. I encourage you to keep the discussion going. Have a safe and educational weekend. Good luck D7.