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Roxxie A. Serrano
Professor Jackson Frasier
HDF 413
October 20, 2014
Senate Retreat
These retreats are not what I think about when talking about retreats. The retreat on
October 18, 2014 was conducted for Senate with an approximately of 50 participates. Not all
fifty participates showed up, more like 30 individuals showed up but we continued anyways. The
retreat started off with the energizer called shake 8s, the group began to participate with out any
hesitation. The next activity that we did was give each person three stripes of paper and asked
them to write one word that emphasizes what they bring senate, how they feel about senate and
what have they learned about senate so far. From there, each person talked about what he or she
wrote and why he or she wrote that. The next thing that was done for that activity was that they
linked the pieces of paper together creating a chain. At the end of the retreat the chain was going
to be giving to senate as a reminder of what they expect senate to be through out the rest of the
time.
I believe that the retreat went very well, the groups participated in the debrief quite well,
they started off on a good foot, they did not hesitate to cooperate in the activities. They decided
to put me with Nikki to do the Amazing Maze activity. The rules of the game were that there
could be only one person at a time in the maze and the individual in the maze was the only one
who could talk everyone else had to be silent. If the group talked then they would get penalized. I
was confused with the purpose of the game because that day was the first time Ive ever hear of
this activity let a lone facilitated this activity. From the activity the groups discovered that being
in a group, all should have a say in the actions need to make a decision. Not everyone will be
good at everything; it takes one to develop the thought and the group the finish the task. The first
group had more trouble figuring out the maze whereas the second group figured out the maze

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with more breeze. Nikki was easier with the first group when they did not follow the rules but for
the second group Nikki was harsher. When someone talked that was not in the maze at the
moment Nikki decided to make the group sing a song as a whole. The group decided to sing the
Itsy Bitsy Spider and the add to that penalize Nikki decided to change the route of the maze.
There was a second penalization where Nikki decided to change the route of the maze again.
There were some words that were repeated in both groups and they were frustrated, fun,
confusing, entertaining. After having the two groups complete the Amazing Maze we gathered
together and had lunch. Lunch did not have drinks provided because as a result the Senate forgot
to provide that on their bill.
I conducted the Posse Up activity but I feel as if I did not do a good job because my voice
was not that high when giving the directions to the activity and we needed all of the facilitators
to quite down the group because they were to rattled up. And another thing I felt about the
activity was that it lasted about two minutes because we decided to make it best out of one
instead of best two out of three. The next activity that we did was one where the group put
someone on the spot. The questions were for the most part all the same for every individual on
the hot seat. Questions such as if you were a cocktail, what would you be? Or what do you
expect to get out of Senate? And whom do you see yourself being mentored by? When Larry
took over and asked questions as how many people in the group feel as if they play an important
role for senate or how comfortable are you going to someone to ask as question if you still dont
know as well as is their someone in the group that they trust. The majority of the group
participated and indicated that they felt comfortable asking questions if they do not know
something as well as comfortable to go to someone if they needed something. Senate indicated
that this retreat as been very entertaining and made it easier to talk to each other.

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My five strength are Adaptability, Relator, Empathy, Responsibility, and
Deliberative for facilitating this retreat I believe three main strengths that were embraced were
Adaptability, Relator and Responsibility. For my first one adaptability, I was coming into this
retreat not knowing what we were going to do for this retreat because yet again I was unable to
attend the meeting because of the time conflicting with my classes. Another thing is that I do not
know any of this activities because I am a first time student in this organization. So when the
other facilitators ask if any one has heard about any of the activities conducted Im on the same
boat as them. My adaptability strength comes into play because I simply went with the flow until
I grabbed the concept of the activity for Shake 8s I thought that you continue to shake
everything eight time I did not know that you decrease a number each round you go about. For
my next strength used to facilitate this retreat was relator because I when a participate all
debriefed the Amazing Maze all of the words they used to describe the activity were running
through my head. I put myself in the groups shoes because I would not be able to figure out the
maze route in one try especially when do not give you the staring route of the maze. Finally, my
last strength, Responsibility, I felt played an important act in facilitating this retreat because I
could have be somewhere else or probably in my bed but it is my responsibility to complete my
facilitating duties to get my grade in this class but I also feel that I was responsible to obtain
information of the retreat which I did by coming early and asking what was going to happen and
what we need to get ready.
Just as the groups I learned that a group does not revolve around one individual it takes
several individuals to make a final group decision. A group can learn from someones mistake
and improve from there. Another thing I learned was that just because you make a mistake
doesnt mean that mistake was not taking into consideration or your any less for that. We learn

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from our mistakes and nobody is perfect. Never give up even when hard time hit us because
eventually good will come to you.
Overall, the retreat went well even though we ended the retreat a half an hour earlier then
the expected time. The group felt as if they learned something more about each other going to
this retreat as well as enjoyed all of the activities given for this retreat. SOLC achieved the goal
that Senate wanted to get out of this retreat. I learned some activities that I did not know prior to
this retreat.