On Tuesday, September 4th, we had an FSG planning meeting. Although not everyone could attend, we went ahead and brainstormed/rehashed a few ideas for our events this fall. It would be really great if we could use the comment section under this blog entry to discuss and respond to those ideas, so we can get started setting some plans into action. If you have other ideas that aren't listed here, please put those in the comments, as well.

Potluck! We're looking at Sept. 21st or 28th as possible dates. What do you think? More info coming soon on the listserv.

Last fall, The FSG had a grad student panel called "Feminism in the Classroom," which was really well-attended and interesting. We would like to do something similar this semester, maybe with a more specific focus. The two ideas we tossed around were:

Authority in the Classroom—Catherine B. brought this up at last year’s potluck. It would be a panel about teaching, particularly addressing the ways that we establish authority as grad student teachers and deal with conflict or confrontation in our classes.

Maintaining Public Spaces in Grad School, like Broken Eggs and Chez Cal--Every once in a while, we're reminded of the issues inherent to the shared spaces we use in our department and on campus. This would be a panel about the ethics and practical concerns regarding "policing" these spaces and using them effectively.

If you have thoughts on one of these panels, please be sure to comment below.

Fathers Version of the Academics and Parenting panel: We had a really successful panel on parenting last fall, but it was an all-woman panel, and several people expressed an interest in doing one for fathers this year. Lydia W. is sounding out interest in the panel in our department and among the grad student parent community, but we definitely know that some professor-fathers are interested. What do you think?

Mentor Panel—We've talked before about setting up a panel about mentorship, possibly with some grad student mentor pairs and professors who are involved in mentoring. At this meeting, we talked about tabling this idea for a little while and seeing if people are interested. What do you think?

Finally, last year we hosted a presentation from the Gender and Sexuality Center called LGBTQ 101. As we look toward the spring, we would like to look into having more educational programs from groups on campus. Any ideas?

Really finally, Kate has posted some open thread type entries on this blog about the first year of grad school. If you have the time to scroll down and check them out and add to the comments, that would be great.

Thanks so much to everyone who made it to this crazy meeting and to people who emailed--I'm so sorry it ended up being weird in time and location! See everyone at the potluck! And in the comments section... :)

--Layne