Tuesday, September 23, 2008
The Faculty at Commencement
For faculty members at Baylor, it is a great honor to be asked to participate in commencement. At each commencement, three or four faculty get that opportunity to either give the commencement address, hood the graduates, or give the invocation. Last night I put together a list of the commencement participants going back to 2005. I have bolded the names of full-time faculty members at the time of the commencement:
Summer 08
Speaker: Counseller
Hood: Powell
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Serr
Spring 08
Speaker: Counseller
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Powell
Invocation: Serr
Winter 08
Speaker: Essary
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Serr
Summer 07
Speaker: Trail
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Cordon
Invocation: Counseller
Spring 07
Speaker: Powell
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Brad Pierce
Winter 07
Speaker: Counseller
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Osler
Fall 06
Speaker: Powell
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Beal
Summer 06
Speaker: Chet Edwards
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Wren
Invocation: Osler
Spring 06
Speaker: Essary
Hood: Powell
Hood: McConnico
Invocation: O'Brien
Winter 06
Speaker: Priscilla Owen
Hood: ?
Hood: ?
Invocation: ?
Fall 05
Speaker: Powell
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Underwood
Invocation: Essary
Summer 05
Speaker: Powell
Hood: Guinn
Hood: Osler
Invocation: Essary
Some general observations:
1) Jeremy Counseller is getting to speak, which is a great choice-- he gave about the best commencement speech I have heard.
2) The list of participants is dominated by PC Profs and David Guinn. Again, I think these are rational choices. The PC profs (and the LARC profs) work harder than any law professors, anywhere, and have an incredible amount of face time with students. David Guinn is one of the best teachers a student could have, and defines this institution in a very positive way.
3) That said, only 16% of the appearances by full-time profs are outside of those who were or are in the PC program + Prof. Guinn. Prof. Bates, for example, was properly named by Texas Lawyer as the school's "Most influential professor," but did not appear once in this period. Prof. Beal, who perhaps is the most influential professor in Texas within a discrete area of law, only appears once. In addition, since Melissa Essary left in 2006, not a single current full-time female Baylor professor has been asked to participate in commencement in one of these roles, while there have been 30 appearance by full-time male Baylor professors.
[Please note: I think that I am one of the people whose face has been over-represented at graduation]
Comments:
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based on my experiences with the Admin, I think that the selection of a speaker tends to be a farce.
BU Law has selected speakers in the past who are famous alumni over the objections of students, none of whom "nominated" the said speaker.
Also, I hope that the votes for those "nominated" for speaker are handled fairly, though I doubt they really are. I've never seen any results other than the announcement by Tobin, and based on my polling, the results could not have been true.
I'm sure the admin picks the top vote getter prof when a big-donor/semi-famous alumni isn't available.
Wasn't one of the students on here selected to speak, but mysteriously lost the vote to a prof?
BU Law has selected speakers in the past who are famous alumni over the objections of students, none of whom "nominated" the said speaker.
Also, I hope that the votes for those "nominated" for speaker are handled fairly, though I doubt they really are. I've never seen any results other than the announcement by Tobin, and based on my polling, the results could not have been true.
I'm sure the admin picks the top vote getter prof when a big-donor/semi-famous alumni isn't available.
Wasn't one of the students on here selected to speak, but mysteriously lost the vote to a prof?
# posted by 
: 2:08 PM
: 2:08 PM
I think the student who wanted to speak you are thinking of was Chris Fahrenthold, but he came in third.
# posted by : 2:22 PM
: 2:22 PM
how about baylor's 2 federal clerks, not so bad compared to other schools
http://lawclerkaddict2009.blogspot.com/
http://lawclerkaddict2009.blogspot.com/
# posted by : 2:46 PM
: 2:46 PM
I don't think that survey is right. I know more than two who are clerking for federal judges, or at least were offered positions with federal judges:
Joe Rivera
Lane Rouse
Matt Acosta
Joe Rivera
Lane Rouse
Matt Acosta
I graduated in '05 and we had Kirk Watson speak at graduation. I was always curious as to how he beat out everyone else that was voted on.
# posted by : 5:10 PM
: 5:10 PM
Why not just count the vote ourselves before turning them in? Not that I am to that point yet, but it would seem to make sense.
# posted by : 5:38 PM
: 5:38 PM
I'm with you anon 4:10. That was my graduation and no one I talked to ever mentioned that they "nominated" Kirk Watson. Then Tobin refused to release the vote totals to me when I asked.
anon 1:22 - that year, how do you know that Chris came in 3rd? Did you actually see the totals?
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anon 1:22 - that year, how do you know that Chris came in 3rd? Did you actually see the totals?
# posted by : 9:06 PM
: 9:06 PM << Home
