People miss informal events with professional peers, and sections may be looking to create opportunities for unstructured conversation and mingling. Here is a recipe for a social event such as a happy hour/coffee hour for section members.
Step 1: Choose a date and time that you think people will be available. Thursday early evenings seem to be a good time, since people haven’t totally checked out for the weekend, yet most of their week is behind them.
Step 2: Set up a virtual meeting through Zoom or WebEx. If you want to try something different that allows for virtual mingling (people can roam around the space with their avatar and speak with different people), check out Gather.town, which is free for up to 25 people.
Step 3: Spread the word to section members about the event, and emphasize that there is no formal agenda, but rather the purpose is to… (get to know one another better, welcome new members to the section, etc.)
Step 4: Even though you said no agenda, you might want to use breakout rooms or have some general discussion questions to prompt people to begin talking. You might consider icebreakers to start things off; polls with humorous answer choices can be a simple way to break the ice.
Step 5: End on time. People will want to see that they can come, enjoy themselves, and make new connections, but that it will not take too big of a chunk out of their day.
