Resetting The Table

Resetting the Table's celebrated training and toolkit equips leaders and institutions to build productive communication across political divides. RTT implements the following strategies: • Forums for... crossing divides: we craft and facilitate targeted opportunities for meaningful discussion and learning across ideological “bubbles” of American and American Jewish life. • Intensive facilitation training: we deepen the field of skilled practitioners with expertise to support cross-conflict communication. • Capacity-building for leaders and institutions: we equip community and faith leaders to convene courageous conversations and build a culture of dialogue and deliberation in and across their institutions. To date RTT’s programs have directly reached more than 17,000 participants, many of them multipliers positioned to make far-reaching culture change and impact tens of thousands more. After years of focus on volatile disagreements surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict among Americans, in 2017 Resetting the Table’s team of veteran mediators launched a new program working to bridge red/blue and urban/rural divides in the U.S. This new program began with a Listening Campaign and series of dialogue forums bringing together more than 300 residents of politically diverse, rural counties in southwest Wisconsin and northeast Iowa. In its work fostering dialogue across political divides on Israel among American Jews, RTT has worked with hundreds of Jewish communal organizations, including more than 60 Hillels, 20 Jewish Federations, synagogues, rabbinical seminaries, and more. RTT has innovated a methodology and toolkit from which communities across the country now draw inspiration and support. RTT has opened unprecedented communication among divergent, influential community leaders – many entering the room estranged, angry, and mutually dismissive – never imagining they would be in a room together, let alone walking away with new insight, relationship, collaborations, and sometimes even changed minds. Participants regularly report having conversations they had not thought possible.