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In the spirit of awesome forums (I found last Friday's forum by Matthew Bowman particularly awsome) I decided I would make a list of my favorite forum speaches so far at Southern Virginia University. There are a lot that I like, but I decided the best way to do it was to choose my top 5.
So here they are:
5.Julie B. Beck : http://svu.edu/speeches/forums/2010/julie-beck
We gained an immense amount of legitimacy when the current relief society president paid us a visit. Sister Beck was intensly humble and real, which I respect. A lot.
4. Bill Nack: http://svu.edu/speeches/forums/2011/william-nack
Writer of Secretariat, and master storyteller. I helped to set up his arrival. Not only was I in awe of his ability to tell a story, but I was also amazed by how cool a guy he is.
3. Terryl Givens : http://svu.edu/speeches/forums/2006/lightning-out-of-heaven
One of the foremost LDS scholars of our day, and I missed his forum speech. I was at SVU in January of '06, but I'm sure I was too busy trying to date a girl that hated me, or sleeping, to go to such a great forum. I've listened to this a few times online to make up for my mistake.
2. David Campbell : http://svu.edu/speeches/forums/2011/david-campbell
An expert on religion, politics, and civic engagement. This one was a double header. A great forum speech and a great presentation to a smaller crowd afterwards. His views on building a more open LDS environment were quite inspiring.
1. Diana Douglas : http://svu.edu/news/archives/2009/dianna-douglas-forum-oct-23
Producer for NPR, and all around interesting person. For some reason the audio recording of this is not available on SVU's website. This is the first forum I remember attending after returning home from my mission, and it left a big impact on me. At the time I was considering going into the field of journalism, and was bothered that we didn't have a program. When I asked her if it would be best to transfer, her response was "absolutely not. No one cares about your major." She explained to me that news organizations value diversity of thought more thant the formal training of journalism prorams. "A philosophy major, or history major brings a unique pesrpective on life. That's what they're looking for." Needless to say, I stayed.
Sarabethshafer says:
That comment about journalism is super interesting because Dr. McDonnell told me the same thing back in 2005 when I was very much interested in being a journalist. He said to find a major in something I really love so that when I go to look for jobs for papers or magazines, I'd be an expert in that particular subject and that would put me ahead of so many "Journalism" majors in getting the job and being able to write about whatever I love for a career.