First Wednesday Speaker Series
An intelligent mind acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge. –Proverbs 18:15

Civil Discourse: Bridging the Many Divisions in Our Society

Wednesday, February 5, 6:30–8:00pm
Fireside Room

How to have meaningful interactions among people who have differing views on important topics in our communities, and how to find common ground. Some organizations like Better Angels, League of Women Voters (Civil Discourse committee), Essential Partners and My Country Talks promote ways of having meaningful dialog through respectful listening and discussion.

Mr Barrett is a retired mediator, facilitator, and consultant in collaborative problem-solving with more than thirty years of experience in the alternative dispute resolution and consensus-building fields. His work focused primarily on multi-party projects, often involving environmental concerns. An environmental lawyer by training, he has degrees from Stanford University and Berkeley School of Law. Before beginning his practice, he was the program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation responsible for its grants in the environmental and conflict resolution areas. He has served on a number of environmental, professional organization, and church boards and loves hiking in the Sierra, along with learning more about how to strengthen democratic institutions and constructive citizen engagement.

Tony Stieber is a member of Bethel and worked at Hewlett Packard and Agilent for over 30 years, where among other roles, he managed business partner relationships and outsourcing programs. In this work, he negotiated agreements and enjoyed finding ways to get people and organizations to work together despite differing goals and cultures. For three years, he was ‘loaned’ to the East Side Union High School District in San José to work with high school students considered to be at risk for graduation. While he is currently engaged in aviation (where rapid negotiations with air traffic control are a key part of the job), in a previous life, he worked as a school teacher in Ghana and Kenya. Hobbies? Hiking, camping and biking!

Bob Barrett and Tony Stieber are members of a Santa Clara County-based Committee of the League of Women Voters which promotes Civil Discourse and trains community members in ways to have more productive dialog.

Dinner is:

• Gyro Platter: beef, lamb, hummus, salad and rice
• White Bean Salad
• Dessert

catered from Tuba Express.

A freewill offering of $15 helps us cover costs.

If you plan to come for dinner, we really need to know. Please register on Signup.com.

See a list of past First Wednesday speakers.