‘Longest Table’ event at Brandeis satisfies hunger for important community conversations

Brandeis Stories

'Longest Table' event at Brandeis satisfies hunger for important community conversations

April 27, 2026 • General

By design, "The Longest Table" events are not overly structured; the nationwide network of free, open conversations over meals to "remember what community feels like" include some facilitation and guidance, but the overall goal is more expansive: just pull up a chair and connect.

The nonprofit movement that started in New York in 2022 and spread to more than 30 cities across the country was created to test a theory of its founders: put up a table, invite your neighbors, eat and talk.

At Brandeis' version the din of conversation in the Usdan Student Center Ballroom on a recent afternoon started quickly and never quite died down. And that's just how University Professor Anita Hill, a co-organizer of the event, wanted it.

"I love the noise you are making," she told the more than 170 students, faculty and staff who attended. "I'm hoping you will continue to do so."

Along with Senior Program Administrator Lanni Isenberg and Daniel Kryder, Louis Stulberg Chair in Law and Politics, Hill brought the lunch group together to tackle questions about what makes a just community.

Hill said that at its foundation in 1948, Brandeis was envisioned as a center of academic excellence that would embrace an ethos of knowledge, truth, fairness and inclusion and welcome marginalized and excluded populations into its community. She said events like The Longest Table build upon that ethos.

Table facilitators asked about the importance members of the Brandeis community place on fairness and cooperation, truthfulness and transparency, humility and empathy, and intellectual and social curiosity.

"We're hoping to rebuild a sense of belonging at Brandeis," Kryder said.

Efosa Ologbosere '27, a 2026 fellow with the Eli J. & Phyllis N. Segal Citizen Leadership Program, is majoring in politics and American studies, with a minor in legal studies. She said she decided to come because was interested in sharing a meal with her fellow Segal fellows, but was also curious about the types of topics people were talking about at the event.

She said important conversations too often happen only within the confines of the classroom; it's critical for students and faculty to continue those conversations, and hoped to see more events like The Longest Table facilitate that.

"Talking over dinner is a lost art," she said.

Supported by an institutional impact grant from the Lilly Endowment, the Brandeis Longest Table event was viewed as the start of a longer conversation, according to the organizers.

"Our team, which includes Senior Research Associate Eunjung Jee and Andrew Howard (Heller MPP '19), along with Lanni, Dan and I, are reading through the information we collected from our Longest Table guests and table hosts," Hill said. "We are learning and sharing what we learn as we go. And we hope to keep our community engaged through future events and meetings."