by Melissa Burt

On Sept. 25th, 4 IGC fellows and 1 GCC faculty got together for the FIRST IGCoffeeConvo of the fall semester!

IGCoffeeConvo is a new regularly occurring (~3 per semester) event for small groups of IGC students to get to know a GCC faculty member in an informal setting. This event was created out of growing interest among students to get to know the 70+ GCC-affiliated faculty a little better. To address this need in a new way, the fellows decided to create a informal, small-group setting for students and faculty to connect, and IGCoffeeConvo was born! 

The goal is simple: get 1 faculty and 3-4 students together for ~1-hour for coffee/tea and see where the conversation goes.  Participants can talk about whatever they choose: academic life perspectives, favorite foods or hobbies, grad school experiences, research interests, science-policy, interdisciplinary research, etc. We hope IGCoffeeConvos will help our rapidly growing community maintain a smaller sense of community over time. 

For the first IGCoffeeConvo, GCC Director Bill Hopkins met with fellows Melissa Burt, Devin Hoffman, Lauren Maynard, and Alaina Weinheimer at Deet’s Place. It was a beautiful September afternoon in Blacksburg, so they enjoyed their coffees/teas outside. Their conversation covered a variety of topics from the recent IGC fellow float on the New River where there was a record number of floaters to the (at the time) upcoming IGC Picnic that would occur the following week. The fellows and Bill also discussed what funding students might expect from IGC in the foreseeable future and possibilities for fundraisers that could contribute to that (e.g. selling t-shirts, silent auctions at our socials, etc.). 

If you are a GCC Faculty member and interested in participating in an upcoming IGCoffeeConvo, please contact Nicole Ward at nkward@vt.edu. Fellows should keep an eye on their email inboxes for opportunities to join in on future IGCoffeeConvo meetings!