Wicked Awesome Professor Numero Uno!

Wow. It’s been a crazy couple of weeks! I have been swamped. Papers and tests and meetings, OH MY! I have so much I could write about here, but I think I’ll save most of it for another day…

Since I tend to blog a lot about events and my life in general, I thought I’d start something new. Every now and again, I’ll try to highlight some of the outstanding professors we have on campus—the ones that have personally impacted my life, the ones who are doing amazing things on campus, and the ones who are just plain cool.

My first wicked awesome professor recognition goes to *obligatory drum roll here* Dr. Meg Upchurch! I’m in Dr. Upchurch’s Experimental Psychology of Learning class right now and she has quickly gained my respect as one of the best professors I have had so far. She’s engaging, clear, friendly, and she gives hilarious examples of key concepts that I don’t think I’ll ever forget. I enjoy going to her class every Tuesday and Thursday, and not just because I’m a psychology major, but because she has an uncanny ability to make any aspect of any of our topics interesting to anyone!

Dr. Upchurch isn’t just a wicked awesome professor because of her teaching style, but also because she’s doing amazing things on campus. Last Thursday night, I attended a screening of the frontline documentary, “The Medicated Child,” and participated in a discussion group where my fellow students and I, with the help of student discussion facilitators, reacted to the problems presented by the film and discussed possible solutions. This event was sponsored by Dr. Upchurch’s “Drugged America” program, which serves to educate our student body, over the course of 2 years, about the increasing reliance on drugs in America. Dr. Upchurch is getting most academic fields involved, so we get to learn about this issue from a number of different perspectives (now that’s liberal arts!) So far I have had the pleasure of attending a Lecture on the History of Drugs in America, The Medicated Child screening, and I am planning on attending future events, which will include a discussion on drug resistance led by the biology and chemistry departments, a showing of the movie Euphoria by the music department, and several others which are still in the planning process.

Transylvania’s extraordinary professors played one of the biggest roles in my decision to come here. Valuing my education and community involvement as I do, when I saw how invested professors become in their students’ success and how involved they are in Transy’s campus community, I knew I had found a special place. So cheers to Dr. Upchurch and all of the other wonderful Transy faculty members, a few of which I will continue to highlight here and there in my blog.