Slowbillard podcast 1
 
Hello Herald Heroes, this is your devoted advisor/teacher launching a shot-in-the-dark effort to explore how a new-to-me technology might help me get you more engaged in learning how to compose stories. Also, after thinking about how slowly I speak, I thought you might appreciate having the opportunity to listen to a recording that you can speed up to your warp-speed mind’s abilities. 
 
All this raises some fundamental questions: 

1. How does this technology help me teach journalism? 
2. More importantly, how does this technology help us deliver our journalism to our audience?
3. Who is our audience? Students? Faculty? Staff? Parents? Do we create content that matters to anyone beyond the North Cross community?
4. What kind of content should we be creating?
5. When, or really how often should we be publishing our content digitally?
6. Where, or really what format is or what platforms are most useful for reaching our community/consumers? (If we consider them to be consumers, it makes sense to acknowledge how important it is for us to raise money through ads so that we have money for buying technology.)
7. Why do we do this thing we call journalism? Let’s make sure we stay focused on the why, which is also the what. What is the point of all of this? I have some strong ideas about this essential question, but I want to hear what you think. Ultimately, you have to care about the stories we create in order for people to care about consuming the content. You students know best what our audience wants, because it is probably what you want. What would you want to read/hear/see?
8. How do we create content? How do we compose stories worth reading/hearing/seeing? 

​That is a tough act to follow. I always heard that you never want to share the stage with cute dogs or cuter kids.
But seeing my daughter dance with the rest of the ECP kids and our footballfriends warms my heart and reminds me why I love being here.
I’m grateful for the opportunity to say something today. Some of you may know that I’m writing an update of the school’s history. I think of the project as a thank-you to the school for all it has done for me – especially since my accident two years ago. But the truth is that very few people will read that story (and I’m generally optimistic), so I’m glad to have the chance to make my gratitude public. It occurred to me that in order to be truly grateful, I need to be aware of all the gifts people have given me. It seems almost impossible to keep 
To be brief, there are a few groups of people I want to thank:

1. First, the Leadership Team led by our new Head of School Thank Armistead Lemon for making this wonderful idea a reality. I love it.
2. Thank you to the parents – like the Bloomfields who helped lead a Go Fund Me that supported me and my family through tough times. Nearly 200 people contributed to that fund.
3. Thank you to the faculty – so many of whom helped feed and support my family – led by Mr. Belderes and Mrs. Jackson.
4. And staff – who have made every aspect of my experience on campus better.
5. Thank you to the students – especially the fearless 15 members of the Herald staff who help keep journalism alive. We’re going to pass out our first issue tomorrow! 

When I’m on campus, people go out their way to help me – holding a door open, helping me get something I cannot reach, or just chatting. I feel so fortunate – and I’m grateful to all of you!

1. Of course, thank you to Abby for being such a great daughter to me and Melissa. And to my wife for being my superhero.

In fact, I read that gratitude is a superpower. It was in a children’s book, so it must be true! Perhaps everyone can take a moment and think of saying thank you to someone who might really need to hear it.