November 5, 2024
Dear RC Teachers and Reference People,
We originally posted this email a year ago, but it remains relevant today.
Online, non-geographic fundamentals classes (and geographic fundamentals classes with a couple of online members from outside the area) have become an important part of RC. We started these during COVID and continue to get many requests for referrals to such classes. Online classes give a good start to many people, and they reduce the waiting time for starting RC, which has been an ongoing problem in many places.
Our wish for these classes is that they give people as full an experience of the fundamentals of RC as possible. At some point, we would like the teacher to think with each of the online non-geographic students about joining a local RC Community where they live. Explain how RC is structured and share that our experience is that people gain more benefit from RC if they are rooted in a local RC Community, where they would have opportunities to meet other local Co-Counselors and participate in other local activities, like support groups and workshops. As more classes return to meeting in-person, it would give them that important opportunity as well.
If there is no local RC Community where the person lives, please inform the Regional Reference Person for that part of the world about your student and ask them to think about integrating them into that Region.
Some individuals may want to stay in an online, non-geographic class indefinitely, with no plans to make contact with an existing local Community. We will leave that situation to you to reference. Please think together with your local reference person about this student. That might be the best solution for some people, and others should probably be nudged to make local contact.
Thank you for leading these classes.
With love and appreciation,
Tim
TJ/ds