The Tissue Crew
Join peer-led groups of fellow members, gather in-person, get some snazzy swag, and double your support for Connective Tissue.
Peer-Led Groups
Participate in member-led groups organized around shared interests, needs, and opportunities, and get access to a platform to facilitate self-organization.
Microgrants
Apply for microgrants for member gatherings. Get together in-person and identify how you’d like to self-organize in the future. Only the Tissue Crew can apply, but gatherings are open to all members.
Priority Registration
Receive priority registration for our annual gathering — essentially, the opportunity to sign up a few weeks before registration opens to all members.
Swag
Get your choice of Connective Tissue swag each year you’re in the Tissue Crew. Our 2026 swag options can be found here.
The Expectations
A peer-led, member-driven experience that is enabled by Connective Tissue, but not dependent on it.
Members’ Role
The Tissue Crew will be driven by its members. Members will be responsible for organizing the peer-led groups, planning and hosting member gatherings if they receive a microgrant, and contributing to and improving the Tissue Crew experience.
Connective Tissue’s Role
Our role will be to create the conditions for an engaged network of peers. This means building the membership base, developing toolkits for organizing peer-led groups, and providing the microgrants — but not adding significantly more coordination work to our plates.
The Rollout
1. Build the Tissue Crew membership base.
We’ll spend July and August 2026 building out the base of Tissue Crew members. Our target minimum membership number is 20 — enough to start at least two peer-led groups.
2. Launch the peer-led groups.
We’ll aim to launch our Tissue Crew peer-led groups by September 2026, member levels permitting. We intend to provide a set of toolkits for organizing and facilitating different forms of peer-led groups, such as case clinics and lunch and learns, and begin testing out a platform for self-organizing the groups.
3. Design and open the microgrants.
We’ll plan to work alongside members of the Tissue Crew to design the microgrants (e.g., size, eligibility, application), and then go live with them by late 2026 / early 2027. The size of the microgrants and the number we can give out will depend on how much we earn through membership dues.
4. Evaluate how it’s going.
This is an experiment, so we’ll be continuously checking in on how the Tissue Crew is going — both in fulfilling its value prop for members, and in its staff capacity required — as we’re rolling it out. We’ll work with members to collectively decide on its long-term direction in the first or second quarter of 2027.
Why Join?
For members who want to go deeper alongside fellow members — and double down on their support for Connective Tissue.
Go Deeper
Joining the Tissue Crew is a chance to go deeper with fellow members — especially through peer-led groups, microgrants for gatherings, and our annual gathering.
Support Connective Tissue
Becoming a Tissue Crew member at the $200/year level is a way to double your support for the Connective Tissue newsletter and membership.
And Get Swag
Plus, by joining, you can get your choice of Connective Tissue swag at no additional cost. Check our 2026 options here.