Building Community While Building Barges

In the spirit of a traditional Barn Raising, where material goods are created and community bonds are strengthened through a collaborative construction event, the Angle Lake Shore Club is announcing a call to action in assembling the final three barges needed for the launch site of the upcoming Fourth of July Fireworks Display.

This is one of those once in a lifetime moments, rarely found in modern times, where neighbors have an opportunity to come together to work collectively toward delivering on a major common goal.

Please send an email indicating your interest to participate in the Barge Assembly Program to: AngleLakeSC@gmail.com. Due to space limitations, volunteer participation will be reserved on a first come, first accepted basis. A formal scheduled will be announced in the coming weeks.

When a community comes together

A barn raising is a collective action in which a barn for one of the members is built or rebuilt collaboratively by members of the community. Barn rising was particularly common in 18th- and 19th-century rural North America. A barn was a necessary structure for any farmer yet the assembly required more labor than a typical family could provide. Barn raising addressed the need by enlisting members of the community, unpaid, to assist in the building of their neighbors' barns. Because each member was entitled to recruit others for help, the favor would eventually return to each participant. The tradition of "barn raising" continues, more or less unchanged, in some Amish and Old Order Mennonite communities, particularly in Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and some rural parts of Canada. The practice continues outside of these religious communities, albeit less frequently than in the 19th century.

Team building is a collective term for various types of activities used to enhance social relations and define roles within teams, often involving collaborative tasks. It is distinct from team training, which is designed by education professionals to improve the efficiency, rather than interpersonal relations. Many team-building exercises aim to expose and address interpersonal problems within a business group. Team building is one of the foundations of organizational development that can be applied to groups such as sports teams, school classes, military units or neighborhoods. The formal definition of team-building includes:

• aligning around goals
• finding solutions to problems
• building effective working relationships

Of all organizational activities, one study found team-development to have the strongest effect for improving organizational performance and could likewise deliver similar benefit to community organizations, as well.

There are proven personal benefits of community volunteerism. Surrounding oneself with new people who may be of different ethnicity, have different backgrounds and views, working together collectively not only promotes learning how to improve collaborative teamwork and build relationship skills, it reduces stereotypes, increases appreciation of other cultures, and works to allow people to discover others that they can relate to.

We urge you to consider taking advantage of this rare opportunity to join with other community members to achieve a successful common goal.