My new department chair thought that having a departmental happy hour every week would be an opportunity to build collegiality and a strong sense of working towards a common goal. Roughly 1/3 of us (faculty) and most graduate students show up every week, but no single of our tenured or untenured Asian faculty ever shown up (even when somebody is buying a round to celebrate an accomplishment) - everyone else has at least shown up once. They don't even give an excuse, they simply don't bother. The chair brought up the issue in our last departmental faculty meeting (in a non-accusatory way of course), but asked me privately if I have any idea on how to increase attendance. Any suggestion?
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