Reflections on Last Week

Last Friday I delivered the AAHE Scholar Talk. I think it went okay, but keep in mind that my idea of success is not vomiting on stage.

This was a big honor for me and I know that is the intent of AAHE. But, and I say this with humor, somebody who created this enjoyed seeing people squirm for a year preparing for this talk.

Last year, when I was presented the award, I had a chance to talk to previous scholars. They all agreed that they needed the one year. I thought…why? I now know.

I don’t know if I was nervous…I tend to get nervous when I don’t think I’m prepared. I felt prepared…but there was this intense anxiety that I can’t explain other than I just wanted to get it over with. That thing (I’ll call it anxiety) was intense.

I left Carbondale on Tuesday morning (5:00 am)…I decided to drive. I woke up about 2:00 am and couldn’t get back to sleep…not good for somebody who is about to depart on a 14 hour drive.

Wednesday night I woke up at 3:00 and couldn’t get back to sleep…Thursday night had the same thing. Friday morning I again woke at 3:00 (my presentation is at 10:15 on Friday). I laid in the bed for about 30 minutes and decided to doing something. So I got my running stuff on and went for a 45 minute run. I got back about 4:30 and laid back down. Fortunately I readjusted my alarm so I woke at 7:00 am. I actually managed to get another 2 hours of sleep (which helped a lot).

I got at 7:00…took a much needed shower (I tend not to fall asleep after sweating like I do after running) and went down for a sandwich and coffee around 7:30. I put the finishing touches on my talk and went back to my room to change into my funeral suit (okay, the only suit I own). I wanted to get over to the room at 9:00 to start getting things set up.

By 9:00 it is absolutely pouring. I’m carrying three laptops, two monitors and a whole host of other equipment. So I take a cab for a five block ride.

It took about 30:00 to get everything set up. I did not want to read my paper from paper…on the other hand I didn’t want to talk with out specific notes (didn’t want a whole lot of umms..uhhs), so I decided to set up two monitors as teleprompters. I put my talk in large font on power point and allowed it to scroll during my talk. It worked pretty good. Plus, they were dark and most people didn’t seem to notice it.

Perhaps it was the anxiety (or nerves) but I’m sweating like a pig (do pigs sweat?) so I’m drinking water like crazy. Karl Larson my roommate for the week went to the nearby bathroom and brought out some hand towels so I could wipe my brow (you know those Marriotts have nice bathrooms).

I don’t remember much from my talk…I kind of went on autopilot. I had practiced it so much that I felt like I didn’t need the teleprompters. But of course, 3 minutes before they’re about to start the laptop with the PPT teleprompter froze. Fortunately the third laptop was ready and so I just swapped it out. Finally, I gave a person I knew who was sitting in the front row my script that I had printed out (in the same bold ppt format). I asked him to follow along and in the event my teleprompter fails he can give it to me (fortunately he didn’t need to do that).

Probably the highlight of my talk was went I went off script and recognized three undergraduates from Gustavus Adolphus College (where Karl teaches). These students participated in AAHE’s Undergraduate Case Study where they were to ‘answer’ a question posed. The question was something like “Wisconsin has received a large grant to educate health educators on the falls of elderly people”. How would you train health educators throughout the state. These Gustavus Adolphus students created a ‘virtual conference’ where they had speakers from throughout the world provide their training. It was ingenious and when I pointed out what they did and where they were the crowd showed them their appreciation with a nice round of applause. Later on we found out they received 2nd place…not bad.

After the presentation I had to tear down the equipment and haul it back to the hotel room. As I changed I realized that almost everything that I was wearing was soaked. I must have sweated more than I thought. It never felt better to slip into some khakis and a golf shirt than it did that afternoon.

That evening I was taken to dinner by 8 very close friends and we had a very good time relaxing. They tried to roast me but since there’s no ‘dirt’ they could dig up on me it was tough (or maybe they were just being nice).

That night was the first full uninterrupted sleep that I had had in several days.

It’s a day I will not forget. I appreciate all of those who were there and those who were complimentary of my talk.

One can listen to the  talk at www.hedir.org.