Original Query from Sarah Benton, CALL, State College, PA
If your LLI has Special Interest Groups, can you tell me how they operate? Does a committee plan them? Do you charge a fee for them? Are they informal? Do they have a facilitator? Where are they held? How many SIGS do you have?

From Jory Peterson, University for Seniors, University of MN-Duluth
University for Seniors has 4 Special Interest Groups (SIGS): Let's Go Show, showing of films, meets weekly; Investment Club, meets once a month; Bridge, meets weekly when US is in sesson; Journey Jargon, a travelogue of US members travels, meets 3 times a term. Attendance is open to US members. SIGs are listed in the quarterly listing of all activities. Each SIG is led by a US. Any US member can propose a SIG and see that it is carried out. Each SIG is approved by the Council. All SIGs meet somewhere on campus on weekdays.

From Martha Klee, Lifetime Learning Institute of Northern VA, Annandale, VA
We have A Bridge Group meets twice a month, has a coordination Discussion Group 1st Friday of the Month, has group leader with participants taking turns facilitating on current subjects. These subjects for discussion are selected by members of the group. Financial Forum, third Friday of the month, with a chair and committee, discussion on investments, money management and various speakers, and Theatre Group, with group leader, which attends plays at Kennedy Center, National Theatre, and several area theatres. We are approaching our sixth year and after a slow start, these groups have evolved as our membership grew to 325. We found the only way the groups will flourish is of course, finding folks who are willing to get it going and see it through. Hope this helps. There is not extra charge for these groups except for theatre tickets.

From Tom Holloway, U3A, tom.holloway@u3a.org.uk, http://timewitnesses.org
If your LLI has Special Interest Groups, can you tell me how they operate? Does a committee plan them? All our (about 600) local members are encouraged to start a SIG by our Executive Committee Do you charge a fee for them? Yes - usually one pound (two dollars?) for tea and biscuits at each weekly session. Are they informal? Do they have a facilitator? Yes. Sometimes the same person over a period of time - several weeks, but SIG members are encouraged to research one aspect of a subject and deliver a talk. Where are they held? In each others houses if less than 10 people, but maybe in a Church Hall for larger groups. How many SIGS do you have? About 50 locally. Twelve of those are 'languages' (2 German, 3 French, 2 Italian, 2 Spanish plus Welsh, Latin, Japanese) and we have 4 Art classes of different sorts. (Important to remember that the UK University of the Third Age doesn't normally use academic or professional teachers. "Those who teach shall also learn and those who learn shall also teach".)

From Kali Lightfoot, Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, U. S. Maine, Portland
Our SIGs here at Osher Lifelong Learning Institute are very informal. If a member comes up with an idea for a group we put it in the newsletter, schedule a time and place for a meeting and see who shows up. So far we have an "outdoor club" which is really a walking group that meets the 4th Tuesday at a public parking lot to carpool to a trailhead, a chess group, a "happy singles" group. Although we have 750 members, all of our SIGs are very small groups. We find that the classes are really the thing that people come to OLLI for. There is so much going on in this area that our special events and things like SIGs do not draw very well. Our niche in Portland (Maine) is really the academic courses and field trips. And we do run classes year round, so we probably siphon off some of the energy that would go into SIGs. We have two activities that started out in the same way the SIGs do, but they have become part of our central core of activities: the Reflections arts magazine, and our Senior Players theatre troupe.