January 17, 2006
I've been suckered again... At my last professional conference, I had five or six people tell me that I should be a Distinguished Lecturer for my professional society. One of them was a past president of the society, but then again, he was on my academic committee, so he might be biased. He did give me the most glowing recommendation, though. At any rate, I decided to fill out the application. After I had decided to do so, a coworker and friend told me that they were always begging for DLs, which took a bit of steam out of my sails. Typically being an optimist (about work), I decided to ignore that comment and found out last week that I had been approved as a Distinguished Lecturer. I actually hate the title, and would prefer something like Discussion Instigator.
At any rate, if I understand things correctly, I'm supposed to give at most six lectures each year for the next two years. It's only been a week, and I've had three requests for talks (Ontario, Ottawa, and Dallas). I confess that I actually wondered who would possibly want me to come and talk? Then again, I do pretty well as a presenter. The best presentation I ever gave was at the conference in 1996. I was a little nervous when my room changed to house more people. No worries, I had a blast. They are lucky I didn't do what I did when I taught trigonometry and force people to answer questions while I was talking. Then again, that was because the class was very early and I had some freshmen being hazed and they found themselves trying to catch z's in my class. I don't think so. I can be very entertaining, and I'm not afraid to use embarrassment to keep people focused.
At any rate, I'm really looking forward to it. I have made arrangements for Annie to stay at a friend's should I have to be gone for a day or two during the week, and I learn a lot from talking to other people about things. I think it will make me even better at my job. However, I'd better get busy creating the presentations. So far, all three have asked for hour-long talks. I can talk forever, but I should probably have slides that support my rambling. Then again, if they would like to hear, 'One time, at band camp...' I'm up for that, too.
Not Distinguished, Not a Lecturer, but very willing to talk...
At any rate, if I understand things correctly, I'm supposed to give at most six lectures each year for the next two years. It's only been a week, and I've had three requests for talks (Ontario, Ottawa, and Dallas). I confess that I actually wondered who would possibly want me to come and talk? Then again, I do pretty well as a presenter. The best presentation I ever gave was at the conference in 1996. I was a little nervous when my room changed to house more people. No worries, I had a blast. They are lucky I didn't do what I did when I taught trigonometry and force people to answer questions while I was talking. Then again, that was because the class was very early and I had some freshmen being hazed and they found themselves trying to catch z's in my class. I don't think so. I can be very entertaining, and I'm not afraid to use embarrassment to keep people focused.
At any rate, I'm really looking forward to it. I have made arrangements for Annie to stay at a friend's should I have to be gone for a day or two during the week, and I learn a lot from talking to other people about things. I think it will make me even better at my job. However, I'd better get busy creating the presentations. So far, all three have asked for hour-long talks. I can talk forever, but I should probably have slides that support my rambling. Then again, if they would like to hear, 'One time, at band camp...' I'm up for that, too.
Not Distinguished, Not a Lecturer, but very willing to talk...