Etiquette Dinner Feeds Students Professional Savvy

Proper etiquette is a valuable tool in life and business. That’s why each year Cedarville University’s career services department hosts an etiquette dinner for students. This year’s dinner will be Wednesday, Nov. 6, from 5:30-7 p.m. in the Stevens Student Center (SSC).

“The etiquette dinner is important because many students will be in situations where they need to know how to appropriately handle themselves in a formal dinner setting,” said Reep. “It may not necessarily be in the beginning of their career, but many of the principles will apply in all dining situations.”

During the etiquette dinner, students are walked through a full course meal with breaks in between courses. The breaks are used to explain elements such as how place settings used to look like, how they look now and how to maneuver through the elements of the place settings. There will also be a discussion about dinner manners and how they have developed over time. The dinner will conclude with a question and answer session on all forms of personal and professional etiquette.

— Jeff Reep

Reep explained how many employers often use casual dinner settings to learn about their employee candidates. Reep mentioned how Henry Ford would have dinner with possible managers, and if a candidate put salt and pepper on their food before tasting it, Ford concluded that these individuals make decisions before receiving information.

In a similar way, employers learn a lot about you in the way you present yourself, noted Reep. “We want to give Cedarville students another tool to use in order to continue the success that we know they have the potential to accomplish,” he said.

Located in southwest Ohio, Cedarville University is an accredited, Christ-centered, Baptist institution with an enrollment of 4,380 undergraduate, graduate and online students in more than 150 areas of study. Founded in 1887, Cedarville is recognized nationally for its authentic Christian community, rigorous academic programs, strong graduation and retention rates, accredited professional and health science offerings and high student engagement ranking. For more information about the University, visit www.cedarville.edu.