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If I had $100

In order to graduate with a computer science degree, I have to take a communication class of some kind. I figured it would be easiest to get it over with during the summer, but my options would be more limited. Actually, my only choice was Intro to Public Speaking.

I have done a bit of public speaking already. When I went to a Catholic school, they would make me do readings in church all the time. I would be given a photocopied passage, usually a letter from Paul to some guys. There were slashes inserted between every few words; that was where I was supposed to pause. And then there was a reminder to count to three or five or something between finishing the reading and saying “The Word of the Lord.” My parents say I was great at it, but I was just following the directions. I never knew what I was actually saying. Nobody told me what it meant.

I was also asked to give a speech at my graduation from that school and again at my high-school graduation. I happily obliged in both cases. (Public speaking is nice when you know what you’re talking about.) And in college, I’ve already had to take a technical writing class, and the one I picked involved a fair amount of speaking, so I thought I had already met the communication requirement. But nopers.

So, I took Intro to Public Speaking during the Summer A semester, meaning I had class Monday through Friday for six weeks. We gave speeches every week. For our first assignment, which wasn’t for a grade, we had to interview a fellow student and present them to the class. Next, we were going to do impromptu speeches, in which we would select a topic and take a few minutes to prepare a short speech. The teacher wanted us to get a lot of practice, so first we did some impromptu speeches that didn’t count. He made us pick topics from the news. Mine went terribly.

For my actual impromptu speech, the one that counted for a grade, we submitted quotations and then we would each have to pick one and offer our reaction to it. I mentioned that one already.

After that, we had to give a speech demonstrating a process. I learned quite a bit from other people’s speeches: how to make a cookie cake, how to give a headlock in jujitsu, how to save gas. I talked about how to write a song. I was going to play a sample from a song I had recorded, but the audio wasn’t working, so the teacher made me sing it. And you thought speaking to people was scary…

Our next assignment was to give a persuasive speech. We would have to persuade the class that a law should be changed. Most people talked about the hard-hitting, life-or-death, hot-button social issues, but I talked about why copyright terms, which are the longest they’ve ever been, should be shortened. I thought I did a pretty good job on that one. The teacher thought the class as a whole didn’t have a lot of enthusiasm, so for the last assignment, he made us do persuasive speeches again.

This time, he said he had $100, and we were supposed to try to convince the class how he should spend the money. Then we would have a vote, and the winner would have the $100 spent on their idea, and they would get an A in the class.

I skipped the first two days of speeches because I was studying for my other classes, and I wanted to be ready for my speech. I thought a lot about what I would want the $100 to go to; I have a lot of pet issues that no one cares about. But then I remembered organ donation awareness, so I tried to persuade the class that the $100 should go to the organ donation awareness group I volunteer with.

I didn’t win—the winning idea was to have a class dance party—but I was glad to get my speech over with. And now the class is done, and I’m home for a week. Yesterday I went to a wedding, and today I’m about to pick up my friend Natasha for the airport. Fun times ahead!

It seems there are always tour groups going around campus—year-round, rain or shine. I’ve wondered how the weather might affect people’s perceptions of my fair university, and I assumed that bad weather would show the school in an unflattering light. Apparently, research shows that the opposite is true.