So you’ve been selected to coordinate retreat, congrats! Below is a general guide to what you need to do for this position, along with a link to the emails I sent as coordinator and other useful goodies.
Essentially, you are in charge of:
- Selecting a Date
- Finding a Location
- Figuring out how many people can come (knowing people will likely add or drop last minute)
- Coordinating transportation there and back
- Working with the food Czar to get food and make sure dietary restrictions are taken into account
- Planning activities if you want (hiking, most SWANKY, going out for ice cream, baking at the house, video games, movies, singing, night walks, murder in the dark, really whatever people want!)
A more detailed step-by-step guide is below, and as always, feel free to reach out to officers or previous tour coordinators if you need help with anything!
First things first, why do we have retreat? Retreat has two main purposes. The first is Most SWANKY, where we read our constitution and discuss it. The Chair is in charge of the running of SWANKY, but just make sure to coordinate with them to set aside a time, usually in the middle of the day, for it to happen. The second reason we go on retreat is to get away from the bubble of MIT and enjoy some well-earned rest and time together as an ensemble. Whether you end up finding a location far away from Boston or in a nearby member’s home, people will enjoy just being away for a few days. No need to worry too much about planning every single moment of the day, maybe find a hike or some light activity people can participate in if they want, but also ask for suggestions of what to do and let it be fluid.
Ok, now moving onto the actual planning of retreat. The first thing you are going to want to do is select a weekend to have it. Generally, we drive down to retreat on a Friday, with cars leaving throughout the day, and then return on Sunday morning. I found that the easiest way to do pick a date was to send an email to members and dartes with a google form that had a list of weekends and asked them to select ones they could attend and then their top choice (just be aware dartes may not yet be on the list until after the show, although they are allowed to go on retreat if they intend to join). I tried to send this email early on, about a week after we got back from IAP, to give enough time to rent cars and find a location before things filled up. With the information from the form, you can usually find a weekend or two that work for most people, and then use this to find a location that is available and within budget for those dates.
Speaking of budget, both retreats I organized cost around $1600-1700 for everything, so ask the officers what your budget is if they don’t give it to you at the beginning. A fuller itemized budget for AY 2018-2019 can be found farther down, but in general the Airbnb tended to cost ~$850 once taxes and fees were all accounted for, so try to shoot for that range (also use the tax-exemption form for big rentals, since you technically can’t get reimbursed for tax through the ensemble).
Now, finding a location! This is really up to you. If you have a member who is local and is willing to host everyone, that has worked in the past. Both years I organized it, we went to North Conway, NH, because it was within the price range and not too far a drive (~3 hours). I’d recommend not going somewhere more than 3 hours away driving, just cause it ends up being a fair amount of time in a car.
Airbnb is your friend for finding locations, and hosts tend to be okay with a theater group from MIT. Given the fact you’ll probably have 16+ people, the host will probably reach out to ask questions about how many people and the purpose of the visit. Be honest, say we are the Shakespeare Ensemble, mention why we are going on retreat and also definitely mention that it is completely dry. Sample images of my conversation with the hosts from last year are below.
When finding a place, make sure to find out if there’s a kitchen (cooking is more economical and fun than ordering food), how many beds there are, if there seems to be a nice common room for hanging out and SWANKY, if there’s car parking, and when quiet hours are. Other than that, just pick a place you’d be happy spending a weekend and people will be happy.
As soon as you have a date, make sure to let the ensemble know so people can plan around then. Try to find a location as soon as you can after finding a date just so you have options and aren’t rushing at the last minute.
In terms of getting a final headcount, I would send an email around the time we had a location reserved with a form asking if people can commit to coming, if they would need to drive up on Saturday for whatever reason, whether they have any dietary restrictions, if they’d be willing to help cook, and asking if they’d be willing to drive to retreat. Another important part of this form is asking when people can leave on Friday, and if they need to come back early on Sunday for whatever reason. This will help you tetris drivers and other members later on.
Once you have a weekend, location, and final headcount, it’s important to make sure we can get to retreat. This is usually done via cars, although horse-drawn carriage or running are also viable options. This is the page on how to rent from Budget or Avis using the MIT code and such. I expanded upon it a bit when I emailed the drivers to tell them to reserve cars, and the exact expansion I used can be found in the email templates below. We’ve found that one or two more normal sedan-sized cars ends up being much less expensive than any number of SUVs, so unless you REALLY need it, I would recommend more smaller cars (also check pricing to see if it’s changed, this is just my experience). Also note that those who reserve a car need to have someone with a credit card there to pay for it; Budget and Avis don’t accept Debit cards when renting cars. Have the drivers reserve the cars for when they can pick them up, and if you can, at this point try to assign people to specific cars so you get a sense of how many cars/drivers you’ll need. Once the drivers have reserved their car, have them forward you the reservation email and mark how much it costs on the budget doc you are totally keeping.
When putting people into cars, try to put the food czar/whoever is in charge of food on retreat in an early one so that they can go to the store and get groceries before it gets late on Friday. A sample food budget can be found on the AY2018-2019 retreat budget below. Food ended up being a bit less than the budgeted $350, but it’s good to give a little bit of breath in budgeting for food and such (also depends how many people end up coming, this budget was for ~20 people and we had leftover food). Picking the food we’ll be eating is up to the food Czar, so just give them the dietary restriction info as well as information on if anyone has mentioned they want to help in the kitchen, and let them run wild with it.
And that’s basically it for organization before retreat! Once you have your date, location, travel, food, and people, it’s just time to let it happen and enjoy it. I listed at the beginning a bunch of possible activities, but also feel free to innovate and come up with new ones on your own or ask for suggestions. Also, in general, a first aid kit is good to just have on hand in case anything does come up.
The last thing is that once we are back from retreat, people (including yourself) will want the money spent on retreat reimbursed. For all travel related expenses, you need to fill out a form on concur as opposed to the normal RFP on Atlas. The treasurer has the specific details about this, but don’t be afraid to bug them if they haven’t sent them to you and retreat has been over for a day or so. Forward the info to everyone who bought something for retreat (Airbnb, cars, gas, food), and then make sure they fill out the form to get reimbursed (although if they don’t it’s more on them than you).
And that’s how to plan a retreat. As mentioned, below are sample emails, chats to Airbnb owners, and other potentially useful documents for you to use if you feel like it. Enjoy coordinating!
Useful Info:
