{"id":573897949,"date":"2025-04-30T21:46:16","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T01:46:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/?p=573897949"},"modified":"2025-05-16T18:06:27","modified_gmt":"2025-05-16T22:06:27","slug":"the-last-lecture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/blog\/2025\/04\/30\/the-last-lecture\/","title":{"rendered":"The last lecture"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today was the last meeting of my in-person class, international media communication. The students ended the semester in much the same way they began. I asked them to go to the library and pick up a book that falls under the broad genre of international media, read it and tell us about it. What’s the book about, why did you pick it up, what would make you recommend this book to others, that sort of thing. In this way, I like to tell myself, we are learning about the magic of libraries. And we all learned about 19 new books, some of them might be summer reading for someone. A simple presentation. Easy points. Momentum into the online final, which opened up Monday. <\/p>\n

In our last few minutes together, I reminded them of the final. And then I reminded them of something I said in our first meeting together, that I think one of the job’s real perks is that I will go off topic, a few times, in the class. I reminded them of my two previous mini-speeches. The first is the true value of an education. <\/p>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

Discovering, for yourself, the joy of learning, which I now tell as anecdote about a former student.<\/p>\n

The second is a bit I’ve done for years, about being mindful of cyclists and pedestrians when driving. Be courteous. Allow room, etc. I am one of those people. Let\u2019s be safe. It’s a whole speech, with comedy and poignancy, but this was just a summary, reminding them of those two speeches to build to my third. <\/p>\n

The screen read:<\/p>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

And this was the moment one of our deans walked into the room.<\/p>\n

I said, “You all took a class which hasn’t been offered here in six years, so you probably only knew the title, and the catalog’s description. And it wasn’t previously taught the way I’ve done it here, so it is new, and, what’s more, you’ve stuck with it.”<\/p>\n

“That,” I said, “takes an open mind, and I thank you for that. And next to an open mind is an open heart.”<\/p>\n

“Put those two together, and you have the key ingredients for compassion. This goes well beyond our class, I’m just being real for a moment here, but I would encourage you to nurture that compassion in your life.”<\/p>\n

“There comes a time,” I said, “when the greatest gift you can give someone is your compassion. There will come a time in your life, and I hope it’s far away and none-too-frequently, when the greatest gift you can receive is compassion.<\/p>\n

“The world needs compassion, It always has. It always will.”<\/p>\n

“And that is why I have always ended each of our meetings the same way. So I say to you one last time … Thank you. Be safe, and be kind.”<\/p>\n

I walked past the dean, to the door, to applause.<\/p>\n

Which is not the first time that’s happened, curiously.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today was the last meeting of my in-person class, international media communication. The students ended the semester in much the same way they began. I asked them to go to the library and pick up a book that falls under the broad genre of international media, read it and tell us about it. What’s the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[101,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-573897949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rowan","category-wednesday"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573897949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573897949"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573897949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":573897950,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573897949\/revisions\/573897950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573897949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573897949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kennysmith.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573897949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}