[menscouncil] Initial planning for April Men's Dinner

Mon Feb 12 11:42:55 CST 2024

Sounds good to me—yes more volunteers for the meal would be great! They can contact me directly if that works easiest.   
I realize that Making and sharing my cooking is part of my ministry and a gift I really enjoy sharing.
Namaste.   Erik

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On Monday, February 12, 2024, 12:14 PM, Bob Dinan <bdinan83 at gmail.com> wrote:

I think charging a nominal fee is the way to go (see my reasons in the thread above).
$10 would work nicely. But is there a number that might have more significance for the Men's Dinner or the Men's Council? $11, because this is the 11th time we've held a spring dinner? $9, because there are nine of us on the Council? $13, because that's how many urgent projects need to be done soon around the church? 
I'm just making this up. But a novel fee would be a good conversation starter around the dinner.
Also - and this is primarily for Erik - as we put together the registration form, should we tell men that if they are interested in preparing food for the meal, that they should contact you? Getting more cooks involved would mean more men invested in the success of the dinner.
Thanks for your flexibility and generosity, Erik, around the planning of this new approach to the dinner.
Bob
On Mon, Feb 12, 2024 at 7:05 AM erik stalhandske <estalhand at yahoo.com> wrote:

Bob, some good points and yes you are correct!  To clarify, I am offering to coordinate with a small group of men bringing home made food for the event—so not a potluck.
  In terms of a fee, a nominal fee could make sense—say $5 to $10 a head.  Have we spent any money on childcare before?  How often is a scholarship used?  My guess is for both of these questions a very small number with a nominal expense.  If charge $10, then those bringing food could get reimbursed for their ingredients.
Snacks are no more than a buck a head if buy chips.  Beer is $3 per person if each gets two drinks.  
Thanks for your questions and thoughts.
Erik
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On Feb 11, 2024, at 8:36 PM, Bob Dinan <bdinan83 at gmail.com> wrote:

I think I'm getting more confused as I read this thread.
Jim mentioned a potluck for Model 2. But I thought in our January meeting that it was going to be along the lines of typical men's dinner. But instead of hiring out the food preparation, a small group of men (Erik, John Russell, et al) were going to prepare something delicious. To me, if we promote it as a potluck, the expectation is that everyone who attends will contribute something (funds, if they don't cook). A potluck is very informal.
I checked back to the minutes of the last meeting. It looks like we didn't discuss what we might charge. My assumption would be that we would charge some amount, just like the other spring dinners that I've attended. Have we ever held a spring dinner with no fee? 
It doesn't need to be $25; we could charge a smaller amount.
The fee would cover:   
   - Scholarships
   - Reimbursing child care (two things that we've offered for the last few retreats)
   - Some number of free drinks/beverages
   - Snacks for the first 30 minutes of socializing as men arrive.
I don't think a nominal fee would keep men from attending - the scholarships and child care coverage should make it possible for anyone who is interested to attend.
How will we know what headcount to expect? Are we still going to ask people to register via a Google form even though there is no fee? I would think we would still want to, but estimating the size will be inherently difficult. When you don't charge anything, there will be people who register but decide that day to not show up (they're not out any money). There may also be people who show up without bothering to register, because, hey, it's free. My hunch is that the number in the former group would outnumber the latter, leaving us with a smaller headcount.
I think that if we were looking at holding a free event, our planning would have gone in a different direction yesterday. I'm not sure this kind of dinner warrants the full program we were considering: panel of speakers, make-and-take activity, etc.
If we can clarify what Model 2 is, I'm not against it at all. But that feels like a different kind of event, more like Dave Borneman's meet ups and less like the typical men's dinner we've offered in the past. We would need to plan for it and promote it differently, setting the expectation that it won't be your typical catered dinner. I'm not against trying it out, but it would be different.
Does anyone have other thoughts before we decide on whether to pursue one model over the other? I don't want to turn down Erik's gracious offer. I just want to make sure that I understand which direction the council wants to pursue, since I now realize that we weren't clear coming out of the January meeting.
Bob
On Sun, Feb 11, 2024 at 5:05 PM Jim Schaefer <jim at jvscontrols.com> wrote:

Seems like we have two models for dinner..Model 1: the restaurant where you just pay and expect a meal Model 2:  the potluck where we work together bring food to each other and expect variety and tolerate hiccups that MAY occur.
I am in favor of model 2 in this case. Using our own skills and creativity to make the food aligns with the theme and we have someone who is committed to making it happen.  It’s a nice break from our pattern.  
We can have a cash bar and pay for other non alcoholic drinks from our ample budget. 

On Feb 11, 2024, at 4:39 PM, Pat Herbst <pgherbst at umich.edu> wrote:

While the amount could be lower, we discussed having some threshold to be able to require registration and to have a count of attendees so that the cooks can calculate how much food to make. We would not want to over or under-estimate by too much. We would also be giving more drinks for free than other years. Having said that, i don't think we debated much the price point. 
I also think that paying something constitutes insurance for people coming who can thereby expect to have a reasonable meal (e.g., vegetarians or vegans having food they can eat, all of us having enough volume, having it at a reasonable time, etc.). All of these things become relevant for people when they are told that the cooking is done by volunteers. I think of this not as a meal that anyone personally offers, but something that the council organizes and so we need to be able to deliver to those expectations regardless of the personal preferences of volunteers. Namely, if people pay for their dinner, they can expect that if a volunteer burns their dish or it is not ready in time, someone will have the resources and feel the obligation to run to a store and buy the food in a pinch. 
We need to think like an organization even if we are a bunch of guys.

Pat Herbst

Professor of Mathematics Education

Editor in Chief, Journal for Research in Mathematics Education

Marsal Family School of Education | University of Michigan

610 East University Avenue | Room 4117

Ann Arbor, MI | 48109-1259 

734.763.3745 | pgherbst at umich.edu

Director, GRIP Lab2400 SEBUniversity of Michiganhttps://www.gripumich.org/

On Sun, Feb 11, 2024 at 4:15 PM erik stalhandske <estalhand at yahoo.com> wrote:

Thanks for the update!   I am prepared to donate my food for the dinner, and anticipated others would do the same.  Is there a reason to charge a fee?  Part of my desire to cook and line up others, was to lower the threshold for entry and make it no cost.  I was not anticipating making food for a fund raiser for the men’s council—
Appreciate any clarification.   
Erik

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On Feb 10, 2024, at 11:05 AM, Bob Dinan <bdinan83 at gmail.com> wrote:

Gentlemen,
Pat, Bill, and I met this morning via Zoom to begin plans for the dinner.
Some of items we agreed on:   
   - Saturday, April 13, at the church (actually, this was agree to several weeks ago)
   - Theme: "Making Friends while Making Things"
   - How we can make connections while building, creating, repairing
   - Tying the dinner into the Skills Inventory that Jim is creating
   - $25 per person (scholarships available)
   - Erik will be providing the food
Before our next council meeting in two weeks, please give the notes a quick read. This will be a focus of our next meeting.
Enjoy your weekend,
Bob
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