FAIRMONT — “Celebrating Culture in Martin County” will take place Wednesday in the CER room at Fairmont Elementary School.

It will be held from 1:30-3 p.m., during the Adult Basic Education class.

A community discussion on race initially took place last October. It was sponsored by Region Nine Development Commission, YWCA-Mankato, Greater Mankato Diversity Council and Fairmont CER. About 45 people came to have a discussion on race and how the community can become more inclusive.

In April, a second discussion took place to continue the conversation and examine what steps the community should take next. Those who had been attending the discussions came up with some ideas, with the help of facilitators who are working with other area communities on inclusion.

In June, a “casual conversation” took place at Graffiti Corner in Fairmont. In August, another took place at Gomsrud Park in Fairmont.

Fairmont CER director Roni Dauer has been involved with these discussions, along with about eight other people. The team has been attending Rural Equity Learning Community sessions, put on by Region Nine, each month in St. Peter.

“Wherever there was a ‘It’s Time to Talk Forum on Race,’ those were the communities that were invited to participate with teams in this rural equity learning community,” Dauer explained.

Five different community groups have been attending the monthly sessions. There they share, examine and explore inclusive practices.

“All of these things are working to make us a better community and a more welcoming community,” Dauer said. “It’s helping us realize the difference between inclusion and assimilation. The difference is everyone has a platform that’s worthy of being heard and inclusion should be a comfortable learning opportunity, which is what we did with the casual conversations. We find our commonalities and just talk. Conversations are great connectors.”

She explained that we cannot just assimilate people into our own personal cultural beliefs, which is perhaps common around here.

Monthly assignments are also given at the sessions to make sure community groups are working toward their goals. Dauer said the Fairmont group was assigned to do some type of community envisioning event.

“Building bridges with casual conversations” is the both the tagline and goal of Fairmont’s group. The Celebrating Cultures event will strive to do just that.

“The public is welcome to attend,” Dauer said. “It’s an opportunity to learn more about a different culture and to simply talk with others.”

While there will be opportunities for causal conversation at the event, there also will be some facilitators leading discussions.

If people would like to bring a sample of food to share that reflects their culture, they can do so, but it is not required.

“The goal is to celebrate that all of us are important to the community and worthy parts of the community and can be contributing members,” Dauer said. “We want to be intentional about how we see other cultures. We all belong at the table but sometimes your brain uses past experiences as a logical set of assumptions until we learn something different.”