On Tuesday, March 18, a group of students attended a five-course meal in the Drysdale Student Center’s West Room.
The menu included fire-roasted vegetable soup, tangy vinaigrette salad, rolls, grilled marinated chicken breast with red-skinned mashed potatoes, and haricot verts. Dessert was cheesecake and macerated strawberries with chocolate ganache.
The cost of the meal was $5.
More than just a chance to eat gourmet food, the event, offered every spring by the Center for Career Engagement Opportunities, teaches dining etiquette to students.
“The Dining Etiquette dinner is a popular event with students,” said Christine Harriger, the CEO’s interim executive director. “We offer this event to help students learn the final finishing touches they need to be successful in interviewing situations, as well as professional settings.”
This year, the event was renamed the Scott Robert Etiquette Dinner, honoring a beloved professor who died in 2023. Robert was instrumental in making the etiquette dinner what it is today. It was the first time the event had been held since his death.
Communication studies professor Dr. Jimmy Roux, Robert’s longtime friend and colleague, hosted the event. Although planning the etiquette dinner has passed to the CEO, both Robert and Roux were instrumental in its development.
When the first dinner was held more than 20 years ago, the school paid a guest speaker to demonstrate table manners for the students. According to Roux, the result wasn’t worth the money.
“It was horrible,” he said. “And that’s when Scott said, ‘We can do better.’”
Robert was heavily invested in ensuring that students graduate from the University of Lynchburg with an air of professionalism. He was a good role model: He knew five different ways to tie a tie and was almost always dressed to the nines.
Roux still has a picture of the two of them in his office, wearing seersucker suits and bow ties. “He was a pure Virginian,” Roux recalled.
When Robert insisted they take over training students in dining etiquette themselves, Roux was not initially enthusiastic.
“I said, ‘Scott, I have no idea about how to do that,’” Roux said. “But we read books and learned all we could about [dining etiquette], and we did it ourselves. It was a great success, and we ended up saving the school a lot of money — and had fun!”
Roux explained that apart from being fun, the etiquette dinner serves an important function in students’ education and can help them immensely in their careers, once they get a foot in the door.
“When you get an interview, people will know you can do the job, but they also want to know you fit in with the organization,” Roux said. “Having been to luncheons and dinners with Scott here and in D.C. and all around, we’ve had impressions of people based on eating with them and said, ‘We don’t want to work with that person again’ because some of the behaviors were just atrocious.
“We want our students to do the best they can. We want to be a university that changes lives, and that means having the best standards that they can have.”
The event’s itinerary is full of information: which utensil to use at what time, how to hold it, where to place it on the table, topics of conversation to avoid, and how not to get caught with food in your mouth when you need to answer a question.
All of these details are interspersed with humor. Roux collects and revels in telling “dad jokes,” and he has nearly eight pages of them. This tradition goes back to Robert, who judged a joke’s success by the groans of his audience.
“At least they’re paying attention,” he would say.
The humor also provides attendees with an important skill: Having a joke ready is a great way to break the ice in unfamiliar settings. It’s another example of Robert’s thoughtful and entertaining instruction.
Students who come to the event are encouraged, though not required, to dress formally. For students who may not have a suit or dress available, Roux recommends using the “Suit Yourself” closet on the third floor of Schewel Hall, another idea of Robert’s.
The Suit Yourself closet is a free service for students who need formal attire. It’s large and well-stocked with quality clothing donated by faculty members. “We’ll give anybody a suit,” Roux said, adding that anyone interested could contact him or Cathy Phillips, the administrative coordinator for business and economics.
For information about the Suit Yourself closet, contact Roux at [email protected] or Phillips at [email protected].
