Course Summary:
One of the first things we heard upon entering the class was that it was going to make us hate sitting through presentations, and that prediction was most certainly correct. Though I already considered myself a competent public speaker, I learned presentation tips that took my skills to the next level. My slide creation is much improved from taking the class, and I now feel pain when I see several bullet points on one slide or multiple, poorly formatted pictures on the same slide. Toward the end of the class, I was able to put these newly improved skills to use with a TED talk of my own about walkable cities and urban design.
But the real meat of the class was working with the presenters. As I took the class in the fall of 2022, I unfortunately did not get to work much with the presenters, but going through the selection process was an invaluable experience. It was fascinating to see the selection committee curate the presenters based on a variety of criteria.
Once paired with presenters, the class truly took shape. It gave me the opportunity to work with both a student and a professor as an equal; it was fascinating to see that what we had learned about presenting gave us something to offer to a professor rather than the other way around. I learned much about cultivating and refining others’ ideas, a skill extremely useful when working in entertainment, as is my aspiration.
As I took the class in the fall, I haven’t had the chance to see my speakers’ final projects. I helped develop Elle Dougherty’s talk on elasmobranchii and Professor K. Chad Clay’s talk on how human rights are relevant to everyone. As mentioned before, I especially enjoyed working with Professor Clay, moreso given that his topic was a personal interest of mine.