TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) — A shared meal that brings Tallahassee students together to connect, converse, and strengthen community bonds.
- The Longest Table gathers public, private, and home schooled high school students across the area for connection and conversation.
- The event promotes understanding, relationship-building, and a stronger sense of community among local youth.
- Watch the video to see the why students return for the event year after year
The Longest Table unites local students for a community-building celebrationBROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Hundreds of high school students took part in a Tallahassee tradition designed to bring the community a little bit closer.
I'm Lyric Sloan in Southeast Tallahassee.
That event is called the Longest Table, and I'll take you inside where high schoolers are sitting down at a table, having a meal, and having real and honest conversations about what connects them and what can make our city and their high school stronger.
"This is one of my favorite days of the year. We have high school students from across the county, public school, private school, home school kids come together and fellowship, break bread, and eat lunch together," Rocky Hanna LCS Superintendent, said.
Every year, the first Sunday in December, a different Leon County high school flips the script.
Classrooms quiet and cafeteria tables become a long table where students from across the district gather.
The goal, to break down barriers and start the conversations that matter to them.
This year was Jamaria Davis's first time, a reminder that high school can be about more than homework and hallways.
"Do more things that students are able to have fun with, and not just come to school and do work and do tests every day, but to get to know their fellow students, to get to know their peers and be able to have a great high school life, instead of it just being work all the time," Davis said.
For others, it's a tradition. Leon High School senior Mark Moore returned for a third year paying forward the welcome he received as an underclassman.
"Coming back as a senior, I feel like I want to contribute back to that younger generation and kind of approach them and and be open for them and kind of show them that it's okay to, you know, meet new people and be open and talk about these problems that maybe seem uncomfortable to talk about," Moore said.
The longest table event is open to every high school student in the area.
Co-chairs of the Longest Table, Dylan Lawson and Talen Owens, said the groups sit with guided questions and are encouraged to mix with other students.
Strangers at first, but potential friends by the end,
"I hope that my peers gain new learning experiences and they meet new friendships, because these friendships can be a networking opportunity that can help them later in life and open doors that they didn't know, that they can have, and it's just really like building a bridge because you're meeting somebody you don't know, and it could blossom into something that could be magical," Owens said.
Almost 400 students came out to Sunday's Longest Table at Lincoln High School.
Co-chairs told me that number is up from last year, which was around 300 students.
They say that shows the growing need in our community, and that connections among some high schoolers are getting stronger year after year.
In Southeast Tallahassee, Lyric, Sloan, ABC 27.
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