Fellowship to Friendship: A Switzer Network Celebration

I really appreciated that the retreat was planned by folks with deep connections to PR. It felt authentic in a way that I have not experienced at conferences/retreats in the past.

The preparation, materials, curation of activities and general presentation and facilitation of the whole weekend was super intentional and encouraged respectful engagement and interaction with PR.  

All quotes in this format are from the participant feedback survey

Planning with Purpose

In order to thoughtfully plan a gathering that felt connective and intentional, Sarah and Cora took part in Priya Parker’s online course The Art of Gathering. They brought elements of the Art of Gathering to the planning committee as a guide to the planning process, particularly pieces around Purpose, Invitations, Activities, and the Roles of the Host.  

Parker defines purpose as “the underlying, animating reason for your gathering.” Guided by questions like “What is the need that you hope to address by bringing a specific group of people together?” and “What is the purpose of the gathering in your own words?” the committee created the following purpose statement for the Puerto Rico gathering: 

The purpose of this gathering is to create authentic, supportive connections between Switzer Fellows across cohorts, geographies, and expertise, while encouraging shared learning, respectful engagement, and meaningful interaction with the people, place, and environment of Puerto Rico.

The purpose statement also guided the committee to choose the name of the event - Fellowship to Friendship: A Switzer Network Celebration.

Choosing Puerto-Rican Ownership

Location and venue are of course some of the most important decisions for allowing a gathering to achieve its intended purpose. The committee identified a few important criteria for selecting a venue: 1) Puerto Rican ownership, 2) a location that allows for connection and activities within the group, as well as engagement and interaction with the people, place and environment of Puerto Rico, and 3) food and lodging in one venue to ease logistical planning. 

The choice to prioritize Puerto Rican ownership was critically important, and also a challenge. With the large expense of lodging and food, it was a priority for the committee to invest in Puerto Rican businesses, instead of sending resources back to the contiguous United States. This choice significantly limited the venues available for consideration, and it highlighted the predominance of large mainland-based corporate ownership of hotels and meeting-places in Puerto Rico. 

Fellows emphasized the difference it made in the feeling and impact of our gathering to be in locally-owned venues. One planning committee member reflected during a meeting that “if I invited y’all to my home and had you stay in a Marriott with a huge parking lot, I would feel bummed out.” 

We were also grateful to have planning committee members on-the-ground who could visit potential venues, ground-truth our impressions, and report back to the committee about how they would really work for our group. Christina and Luis visited multiple venues across Puerto Rico, and the strong winner was Villa Cofresí in Rincón. 

Villa Cofresí is a family business and locally-owned and was a delight to work with. They went above and beyond with special touches to make our group feel welcome, were adaptable and creative to accommodate our needs and the Switzer Foundation’s commitment to vegetarian meals at retreats, and shared about their more than 60 years of history with us during one of our meals. 

We also chose Puerto Rican owned businesses for other service providers, such as our airport hotel (Verdanza Hotel), photographer (Nydia Melendez), and shuttle service (MS Coach & Tours). Christina, Luis and AJ from the planning committee also shared their recommendations for local food, drinks and activities for fellows with down-time or extended stays.

Going Slow

After months of planning, choosing a location and announcing the Fellowship to Friendship gathering to the network, the Switzer team discovered that they would unexpectedly be missing two out of the four staff members at this gathering. The team went through a facilitated decision making process to identify whether or not to continue with the event as planned, change the event scope, or postpone the gathering to 2025. In a world where urgency is the norm, the team decided to live into our values and postpone the gathering by one year. We openly shared our reasoning in a message to the network announcing the postponement: 

“We believe that postponing is the best way to ensure we can hold a successful gathering with a fully resourced team, while also maintaining the foundation’s other work… A tremendous amount of thought and care has gone into the planning of this gathering by the staff and planning committee. We want to be sure that we can support the event at an appropriate level and help the gathering achieve its purpose. In addition, we aim to be responsive and adaptable in our work and to promote a culture of care and well-being within the foundation. We want to make sure that we are placing reasonable expectations on the remaining staff members and supporting them to balance their other responsibilities while we have limited capacity over the next few months.The future gathering will benefit from the planning committee’s hard work and thoughtful consideration to date.”

Ultimately, this postponement had the expected benefit of allowing for more time to continue to plan for an intentional gathering, and an unexpected benefit of allowing fellows to come together in Spring 2025, at a time when many needed extra community support and time for rejuvenation. Gathering in this moment was an important space for connection and healing amid the turmoil in the environmental world caused by the second Trump administration. It was a moving reminder that going slow and being flexible can result in surprising benefits that we cannot otherwise foresee.  

Gathering with this group of people at this particular time in history was something I very much needed as I grapple with the disruptive changes occurring under the current administration - know there are other folks who are navigating the same thing, but are still optimistic and fully committed to the important work they are doing.

The People

With more than 750 fellows in the Switzer Network and a limited capacity for this gathering, it was important to the planning committee to have a transparent process for deciding who would be able to participate. This gathering was also the Spring Retreat for the current cohort of 2024 fellows. 

The planning committee created an application that was open to all Switzer Fellow alumni and asked questions about cohort, geography, expertise, hopes and offerings for the gathering, and their connections to Puerto Rico or the Caribbean. A subcommittee reviewed all applications for completeness, basic compatibility with the gathering’s purpose, and connections to Puerto Rico. Fellows with connections to Puerto Rico or the Caribbean were prioritized, and then participants were stratified by cohort, sector, and expertise and a random selection process was used to select a rich mix of Switzer Fellow alumni to join the event. 

Ultimately, 52 fellows attended, representing the breadth of the Switzer Network. Fellowship cohorts spanned from 1991-2024. Participants traveled from at least four continents, six countries, and 20 US states and territories. Attendees came from work in academia, government, nonprofits, private sector, and philanthropy, and are experts in business, conservation, energy resources, engineering, law and policy, natural resource management, food and agriculture, environmental and public health, climate change, environmental justice, and more. From across these diverse life experiences, Switzer Fellows found camaraderie, support, and rejuvenation for their personal and professional commitments to positive environmental change. 

[The gathering] brought to my personal life much joy and hope as well as new relationships that glimmer with friendship potential.

[It brought me] inspiration to keep pushing in a hard time, peace knowing other people are facing similar challenges in this political environment, new friends!, and new ideas about collaborating with Switzer Fellows.

Purpose-based Programming

The rooting in place and vulnerable way of telling stories of Puerto Rico was really meaningful and I really appreciated the intentionality in that.

In alignment with our intention to hold shared leadership, each member of the planning committee led the planning for one section of the agenda, with help and input from each other. Staff held the role of supporting logistics and facilitation. Prior to selecting activities, we discussed as a group the energy that we wanted each day of the weekend to have and reviewed the suggestions and offerings from the participant applications. Consistently checking in with our purpose and the feeling we wanted participants to have during each session helped the committee to curate activities that aligned with our goals of connection, intentionality and place-based learning. 

I really enjoyed all of the scheduled activities that we had - it was great for us to learn new things together, and to direct our energy on a shared goal or problem. I also loved swimming in the ocean and star-gazing - which opened us up to lots of fun and serious conversations!

Activities began one day early for the 2024 Switzer Fellows, with an extra retreat day before the alumni arrived. The 2024 cohort’s time focused on community building, peer support, and weaving into the larger Switzer Network beyond the duration of the fellowship. 2024 Fellows also got to explore a bit of Rincón with planning committee member AJ Hudson in order to get a better sense of place and have a bridge to begin connecting with the other alumni at the gathering.

The official gathering began on Friday evening with a Bomba performance and discussion by Leró Martínez, a formidable Puerto Rican artist in Plena and Bomba. Leró brought Switzer Fellows into conversation about his personal journey and the origins and importance of Bomba, and gave an energizing performance which had fellows dancing into the evening. Beginning the gathering with movement, fun, and grounding in the culture and place of Puerto Rico set the stage for a deep connection between fellows, shared learning and respectful engagement with Puerto Rico. 

The Bomba! It made me cry with joy and felt a sense of deep connection to my roots.

Each morning of Fellowship to Friendship started with a group kickoff to create a cohesive container for the variety of activities planned by the committee. During kickoff, fellows were invited to check in with themselves and each other through posted flip charts with connective prompts and somatic-based arrival activities, and staff also oriented everyone to the plan for the day. 

Each evening there was a happy hour designed to allow fellows unstructured time to connect with one another. Unstructured time was also built into the agenda to allow fellows to enjoy the ocean, connect with each other organically, and rest. Fellows rejuvenated in the ocean, had fun playing cards and watching the sunset together, and conversations also sparked new personal and professional connections about current conundrums and possible future collaborations and career opportunities. 

Networking while swimming in the ocean cannot be beat.

Some fellows with more experience helped me prepare for an upcoming job interview. I used all their tips! 

Continuing an important focus of the Switzer Fellowship for many years, and responding to an often-requested professional development opportunity, Saturday morning focused on a Science Communications workshop with Puerto Rican science communicator Mónica Feliú Mójer, focused on expanding fellows’ culturally-competent scientific communication skills.

On Saturday afternoon, community organizers from Bosque Comunitaria la Armonía Rincón led participants on a field tour of their community forest restoration project and facilitated a rich discussion about the importance of grassroots conservation for the community.

Inspiring doesn't fully capture the sentiment of spending time with those folks and walking in the very areas that they are working to protect and restore. Seeing how people literally put themselves on the front line to protect what they care about was impressive and provided me with hope for the future of these special ecosystems.

On Sunday morning, the Murciélago Beach Defenders led fellows on a critical reflexive recreation tour of the beach community surrounding Rincón. Engaging thoughtfully with the narrative of ‘beach paradise’ and addressing the impacts of tourism, access, and gentrification on the local community was an eye opening experience and helped fellows discover a deeper perspective on Puerto Rico’s current challenges. Fellows were motivated and inspired by engaging with the beach justice and community forest activists. 

I learned so much from the activists about the current colonial structures and issues at play on the islands as well as the grassroots approaches to dismantle those systems. It was truly inspiring.

This was one of the best "place-based" events I have been to. Really strong connection to the contradictions of visiting a place like Puerto Rico and grappling with what it means to be American, a tourist, and a citizen. It was hard to confront a lot of these things, but it felt really important and grounded to do.

The last activities of the gathering was dedicated to creating connections to last beyond the weekend. A weekend-long Switzer Network bingo competition prompted fellows to seek out meeting new people and learning about each other, and culminated in the final session with awarding Switzer swag and Puerto Rican souvenirs as prizes. To close the gathering, participants co-created community collage to spell out the word “CONNECTION.” Making art together allowed fellows to use a different type of brainpower and build connections while finding images, clipping and gluing around the theme of connecting - with a beautiful and fun result! Planning committee members and staff took home pieces of the collage as a memento from the gathering. 

From feeling nervous to feeling connected

According to responses to our participant survey, when Switzer Fellows arrived at the Fellowship to Friendship Switzer Network Celebration, they were feeling nervous, excited and tired. When fellows left the gathering, they were feeling connected, inspired and joyful. 

The striking change in fellows’ feelings before and after the gathering speaks volumes to the care and dedication of the planning committee and the participants in how they planned for and showed up at this celebration. 

It gave me the space to grieve some of what I am facing right now in my professional and personal life regarding environmental and connected issues. It was also inspiring and a good call to action.

Attendees truly did forge friendships that will last beyond the gathering, best evidenced by an unplanned road trip taken together by four fellows after the event! When three fellows’ car rental fell through, the bonds built at the gathering made it possible for them to connect with another fellow and they decided to stick together for days driving around on the island together. One of the road-tripping fellows said “the only reason that was possible was that we had laid the groundwork of communication and connection at the gathering.” 

This weekend was incredibly recharging, both professionally and personally. I strengthened existing friendships, met folks I plan to be in touch with and connect to other colleagues, and learned about work happening in the island that I plan to research and write about.

Gratitude and future gatherings

We are so grateful to the planning committee, local presenters, vendors and Switzer Fellows who made this gathering possible and so special. It is a testament to the wonderful people in the Switzer Network that an offhand comment at a regular retreat could grow into a multi-cohort gathering with a deep impact on the community. 

The network gathering had a profound impact on my overall personal life, leadership and engagement with the network community… I left feeling energized and renewed for much deeper connections and active service within the network.

We hope this will be the first of more future in-person, cross-cohort network gatherings, and wish to carry forward the intentionality, connections and place-based focus that made the Fellowship to Friendship celebration so special. If you are a fellow interested in serving on a planning committee for a future gathering in a region dear to you - reach out! 

The foundation also hopes that sharing the lessons learned from the in-depth process we took to planning this gathering can be a valuable tool for planning future gatherings within the Switzer Network and beyond. We’d be happy to answer questions from fellows or others interested in learning more about our experience planning with purpose.