Moments of Inspiration!

When I was in San Francisco at the start of this month I got to meet with USF professor David Silver. How nice! I wanted to plant the seed of our What's Good in America Today project in his head and see what he thought about it. We had a lovely lunch next to some sociologists in the faculty dining room, a secret spot I somehow didn't really notice during my three whole years there.

It was one of those certain conversations where there are too many things to talk about because everything is interesting. After having a similar kind of conversation with an uncle this past weekend, now it makes me appreciate how awesome and important those moments, and people are. You can go from unsure to totally fueled, positive and inspired in a mere moment!

Then the bus rolled up right as we were leaving, and both heading the same direction we ran and hopped on just in time. Silver had just a $5 bill but called out to fellow bus-riders for change. Someone in the back did, and a man next to me cheerfully said, "A community effort!"


And for a photo with this post, this sorry one which somehow is the only I took during my weekend in San Fran. Turns out it's kind of perfectly fitting though, since it shows muni and USF.

Professor David Silver

I was lucky enough to be in David Silver's Davies Forum on Digital Literacy class my last semester at USF. That class is the reason I even have this blog! What I most noticed and appreciated about Professor Silver's teaching style then was how much he asks questions instead of gives answers. Somehow as a student a professor's questions and curiosity empower you to think and learn more... And he's so curious that it in turn makes YOU curious about what he's teaching, no matter how you felt about the subject otherwise. You see his curiosity and you think, "Wow this must be really interesting."

So I was thrilled to interview Silver about his approach and philosophies on teaching, and living in the bay area. If you know David Silver you know that two of his main focuses are: gardening, sustainability, and green; then analyzing, creating and studying media. I had fun editing the video and putting the pieces together because though these are separate concepts, they also fit together very nicely and Professor Silver has made a point of meshing them into one: green media.

Oh, and I could not have told his story well at all without the use of fantastic photos from his prolific, well-organized, creative commons-ed flickr account.

Meet David Silver.