He built WHAT?

Some of us have been spending some pretty crazy hours at the mansion lately. Last night, I arrived around back in around 10:30 pm and headed upstairs to the East Parlor, where my office is located. As I approached, I heard power tools and smelled sawdust; for a couple of terrifying moments, I thought that one of my students had finally snapped, and s/he was taking out pent-up frustrations on the lovely hardwood floors or the VBC furniture. All I could think was, "Donna (our office manager) is going to kill me!"

Rounding the corner, I found that the ever-resourceful Blake was in the process of building a teleprompter. Yes, folks. Building. A teleprompter. A few days ago the TCOM kids worked up this incredibly brilliant scheme to make it look like folks were speaking directly into the camera while they read the text of Title IX; they inverted the text (backwards) on a laptop screen, which they then set up beneath the camera, and they used a mirror over the laptop (and under the camera) to reflect the words back to the subject being filmed. Apparently, that wasn't enough for Blake, who returned from Menards armed with enough materials to actually construct a base and frame to hold the laptop and the mirror.

Forty minutes later, Blake was calmly vacuuming up sawdust and the new apparatus was ready for shooting the next day. My point is simply this: that one of the best things about this semester for me is watching the students identify what they need, think through the problem, and then find ways to CREATE solutions. It's not unlike watching Dan and Adam match musical themes to bits of film, or watching the narrative team piece together a story out of a million jigsaw pieces of footage we have shot, or watching the students brainstorm ways to visualize an abstract concept that we want to convey in the film. I was just surprised that this time the problem-solving was so, well, tangible.

Given our struggles with finding an HD projector for the gala screening, I am half-convinced that I will come in tomorrow night and find Blake building one of those, too. . .

The Summitt

Road Trip: University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Assignment: Interview Pat Head Summitt, star coach in the world of women's basketball

All seventeen of us who roadtripped to Knoxville walked into the Pratt training facility on UT's campus not really knowing what to expect. My heart was pounding; I thought it must be as loud as the basketballs that were bouncing all around me.

All of us huddled in our orange chairs in the corner, in awe of Pat Head Summitt. She commands a court of girls who know that on Rocky Top, academics come first and winning is expected at a level we can't even begin to understand. I sat in my chair with a continuous flow of people coming up to me, reminding me that Pat doesn't have time to speak with us, we only have ten minutes, questions have to be clear, concise....

And for a second I wasn't sure if I would burst into tears of laughter. I realized that at twenty, I could quite possibly be giving the biggest interview of my entire life. The list of questions I was staring at seemed trivial and completely unable to help me. Then she walked over.

After introducing myself and watching her return to the court, my mind goes blank. I know she came back and I know we talked. I know I asked her informed questions about Title IX and the success of her program. I know that I did everything I could to keep her talking and giving us as much of her time and knowledge as possible, asked questions hoping she would forget that she had a meeting in ten minutes -- we managed to get twenty-five minutes of on-camera interview time.

I wish I could talk more about the interview. Later that evening, I watched the interview and was completely amazed by my voice on the tape. I remembered Pat's responses, but was so engrossed in the whole experience that I couldn't remember any of the questions I had thrown at her.

I can't say how honored I am to have her respect our project enough to give us her time, and how honored I am that my class would choose me to conduct the interview. Having my classmates surrounding me and an incredibly talented shooter, Blake Brenneman, make the experience perfect and unforgettable. I thank the University of Tennessee, their Women's Athletics Department (especially Donna Thomas) and Pat Summitt for their time with us. The knowledge we gained and footage we captured bring our documentary to a whole new level in so many ways.