"Make Food, Share Food, Spend Time with People You Love": Sullivan Fellows Community Feast
Sophie Aguilar | Nov. 18, 2025
On Friday, Nov. 14, the Sullivan Fellows Cohorts at Warren Wilson College (WWC) hosted a community potluck in the Ransom House Fellowship Hall, where students were encouraged to attend and bring a dish to share.
This event was organized to give students the opportunity to share a meal and have conversations about food, justice, sovereignty and abundance. It also helped foster an understanding of the local foodways, including those on the WWC campus and in the local community.
Kay Bowe is a first-year student at WWC who attended the community potluck. They expressed that they have been making an active effort to be more involved in the community on campus and felt this event was a safe and comfortable place to do so.
“[This event] brings people together that usually wouldn’t be together, and so there’s an opportunity to connect there that we wouldn’t get otherwise,” Bowe said. “I think this was amazing, they should have this event again. I feel like a lot of other students would enjoy this too.”
Sarah Spicer is a member of the Sullivan Fellows. They are a third-year student at WWC and joined the Sullivan Fellows after gaining interest their freshman year. The Sullivan Fellows Foundation is a group that is committed to service and leadership. Through the Sullivan Fellows program, scholarships and retreats are offered, and students find tools and opportunities to become changemakers and invest in a brighter future.
“[The Sullivan Fellows] really seemed interesting with the innovators and trying to do things out in the community,” Spicer said.
Community engagement is one of WWC’s prominently stated values. Hosting a community potluck meal is one way that students and staff strive to connect. Attendees got much comfort from home-cooked meals from a variety of different cultures, ranging from lasagna to cranberry ginger sorbet to quesadillas with handmade tortillas.
“I think the main focus and purpose [of the event] was to build community, while also reminding ourselves of food sovereignty and the importance of that, especially in the time we are in,” Spicer said.
Aili Esala is a third-year student at WWC and a member of the Sullivan Fellows. They brought up the importance of conversations about food sovereignty and the weaponization of access to food, which they see as topics that need to be addressed.
“How do we gather around food and build community around that, and have these critical conversations about food sovereignty and food justice in ways that are more liberatory and life-giving than it’s been learned?” Esala said. “And, [how do we] acknowledge the wild things that are happening around food?”
Multiple attendees of the potluck said that providing a safe space for people to have these important conversations as a group will help strengthen the community and the shared knowledge of these topics. Emily Cobb is a fourth-year student and has been a part of the Sullivan Fellows since her sophomore year. Cobb emphasised the importance of community and comfort.
“We thought if we could provide a space for people to gather and enjoy themselves, we could help provide and help breathe life back into the campus,” Cobb said. “[We also wanted to] highlight the importance of keeping close to one another when we're all facing mutual struggle and mutual issues, because it's nice to have a community to fall back on.”
Along with providing a sense of community and making space for important conversations, this gathering also served the purpose of helping promote an event that is happening on November 19 from 6:00-8:00 in Canon Lounge. “Honoring Indigenous Identity, Culture and Sovereignty” with Chef Nico Albert Williams will include a presentation about gathering, healing and growing as a way of restoring wellness through ancestral foodways, along with a cooking demonstration and tasting.
“I think we sometimes undervalue what community means to us, but I know that I would have a much less meaningful life if I didn't have as strong of a community,” Cobb said. “With how small [WWC] is, it's important to be kind to one another, be loving to one another. I hope if this event brings anything, it's meaningful discussion and showing one another that we will show up to things that matter, that we will be a listening ear and that we will welcome conversations.”