For more than a decade, I’ve worked remotely with clients and co-workers around the globe. Thus I’m familiar with the technology and tools needed to hold meetings, give keynotes, run webinars, and anything else that involves me trying to share information with others through a computer.

Since making the career transition to teaching full time, I haven’t needed these skills as often. Now, my days are spent in classrooms teaching the fantastic students of Wheaton College. But, with the rising concerns around COVID-19 hitting all corners of the globe, it is time to make sure that no matter what you do for work that you are prepared for how to do that work from home.

I thought it might be helpful to my fellow educators (and others) to share some useful tips and equipment in case you suddenly find yourself having to teach remotely. Any advice or endorsements below reflects my personal/professional thoughts alone.

1. Talk To Your IT Department

As a former IT person, I can’t stress to you how vital it is that you talk to your information technology department to find out what tools you have at your disposal and that are approved for use at your organization. They will know what licenses they own and can help you get up and running on the preferred software(s).

If curious, we are using both Zoom and Google Hangouts Meet.

2. Learn The Software

No matter what group meeting software you use, it is vital that you set it up and begin testing it out now. Over the weekend, I set up my laptop as I would in class and went through the process of making sure that everything works as I need it to.

Be sure that you not only make sure that your slides are showing up and that your voice can be heard, but that the recording features are set up as you wish and that you know how to monitor for questions and other features you might need to use in your classes.

3. Upgrade Your Microphone

Your students need to hear what you are saying. Yes, the built-in microphone on your computer will work if that is your only option, but there are better ones out there that won’t cost too much.

My go-to recommendation for an inexpensive and portable option is the Blue Snowball iCE. At $50, it is one of the most affordable options that will give you much better sound. Yes, I use different microphones, but they cost more, and I also use them for podcasting and other adventures.

4. Create Slides of Your Lectures

You won’t have a whiteboard or chalkboard to use when teaching remotely, so I encourage you to create slides for your upcoming lectures. This will make it easier for your students who are following along on a variety of devices to take better notes since it may be harder for them to hear you than in a traditional classroom.

I’ve used Google Slides for years because it allows me to be sure that none of my students get confused by my penmanship or spelling mistakes. I would never want either of those things to get in the way of their learning. When teaching remotely, it is vital to have words on the screen that highlight the main points you are trying to get across.

5. Check Your Surroundings

Open up the camera on your computer, take a snapshot and look at your surroundings. Is there anything in the background that you should be removed? Is there enough light to see your face? How will the light change at the time you are teaching? If you have pets or family members, do you have a room that you can close the door for so that you are not disturbed?

These are all questions you need to think about before starting your first lecture. If you do not have a built-in camera, you can’t go wrong with any of the options from Logitech.

6. Practice, Practice, Practice

Next Monday, when classes start back up, I plan on teaching my class as if students were self-quarantining themselves. I hope to be back in my classroom with a room full of healthy students, but since I always teach from my laptop, hooking up my microphone, starting Zoom and making a recording of the class will only take a couple more clicks. That way, I know for sure that everything works.

You should run through a lecture to make sure you know how everything works and to become more comfortable with the new way of teaching. If you don’t know how to take questions or what it will be like if students have video cameras on, find a friend to test with. Try out any scenario you think might arise so that the first time you are going through, it is not with your students.

Start with those things, and you should be ok.

The key thing to remember is that things rarely go as planned, so plan for the unexpected. All of us are in this together, and if your school has to change to a virtual teaching model in the coming weeks everyone will need to have extra patience as educators, students, and staff all migrate to this new approach.

The technology is there to make this possible. Online education is different than the classroom, but it can be just as effective. To those who are scared by this, I encourage you to try it out. It isn’t as new as you might think, and every day thousands of people are learning online.

Stay safe out there and don’t forget to wash your hands.

As an educator, every shooting at a school gets my attention. I wonder when we will start working to fix the problem rather than hoping it will go away.

Yesterday I thought about writing a post focused on classroom shootings, but the day ran away from me, and I wasn’t sure that I was ready to share my thoughts.

It was a double dose of reading that had me thinking about it more than I usually do. First was the story of Riley Howell and his heroic sacrifice to save students in his class at U.N.C. Charlotte. Then I read his Professor’s personal post about the same shooting.

As someone who spends his days in a classroom full of students, I think about the danger they may be in at the start of every class.

At the beginning of every semester, I talk about how my classroom is a safe space for ideas and discussions. We don’t have to all agree or share the same beliefs, but we will respect each other and act accordingly. But, every time I go through this part of my syllabus, in the back of my head I’m also thinking about how and if I’d be able to help make the classroom safe if anyone was to ever come in with the intent to kill and harm.

I didn’t write about this yesterday and then last night I read about another school shooting. I fear that it won’t be the last one before the summer break arrives.

The reality is our kids are stressed out and don’t know how to cope with the world around them. Anger and violence are an out for them, and the tools of destruction are readily available.

I’m not wired like many around me. I think about and plan for the worse every single day. When I walk in a room, I think about the quickest way to get out. I play out scenarios in my head daily on how to react to and deal with any situation that may arise.

The fact that most schools now conduct active shooter drills helps. Kids today know the reality of what may occur in a classroom, movie theater or place of worship. Their parents may not want to face this reality, but children of all ages know it.

Florida is on the verge of allowing teachers to carry in the classroom. I’ve often wondered if I was allowed to if I would or not.

Last week my students were giving final presentations in my classroom. I always sit in the back corner, directly in front of the door. This isn’t by accident or chance. It is because I want to be first to try and help if something horrible were to occur.

We need to help our children cope and deal with reality rather than continually holding their hands and sheltering them. We need common sense gun law changes. We need to plan for the worse and hope for the best. We need classrooms from all levels of education to be safe places for students to struggle, learn and thrive.

After several years of teaching, I’ve noticed that my approach to education may differ from what you’ve experienced up to this point. I’ve also seen the same mistakes and assumptions made over and over so I thought I’d write this note to you in the hope that you don’t make them again.

No matter if I’m your Professor/Teacher/Instructor I have one goal for you and that is for you to be inspired and learn.

While you will need to memorize definitions and terms in the subjects that I lecture on, the real test for me is that you understand what they mean beyond the words that make them up.

The world is filled with people who earned high GPA’s because they were good at memorizing. I’d instead ensure that when you leave my classroom, you know how to think beyond an exam page and fully understand what you came to learn.

Grades matter, but I’ve always said that I prefer streets smarts over book smarts. I think that is why I believe in the importance of liberal arts being a component of every student’s learning adventure. I wanted that for myself when I went to college, and today I’m getting to help shape that for future generations.

I come to class every day prepared to answer your questions and discuss current events relevant to what we are learning about. When I’m teaching a business course, I want you to know what is happening in the business world. If we are talking about marketing, it is important you see the latest ad campaign making waves.

I hope you’ll come to class prepared to learn. I don’t care if you use a notebook, laptop or another device to capture what I share. Everyone learns differently, and I understand that.

The only reason my lectures are done in presentation software is that my writing is messy and my spelling atrocious, and I want neither of those getting in the way of your learning.

I don’t share my lecture notes because I’ve learned that means students don’t believe they have to pay attention in class. I know that by you taking down the notes yourself based on what is on the screen and what comes out of my mouth that you learn more.

Please, come ready to talk, question and discuss. I hate lecturing the entire class as much as you do so the more conversation we have, the more fun it is for everyone in the room.

Don’t ever think you are the only one with a question or thought on the topic. I purposely ask over and over “does this make sense?” or “are there any questions?” to spark conversation beyond the slides.

My classrooms are safe spaces intended for civil debates and conversations about the topic at hand. We do not all need to agree, but we will all show respect to others and their ideas.

Homework is essential, and I try not to give more than is necessary. I expect you to turn it in on time. You’ve been writing your name on assignments since you first learned to write it in crayon, so I will remind you multiple times that I take off points if you don’t put your name on assignments as a college student.

Proofread, spellcheck and edit your assignment before you turn it in. If I open up your file and there are red squiggles under words, I know you didn’t care enough to fix the most basic of issues.

I expect to see your face in class every day, but I know things come up and early morning classes are harder to make than others. While I may not take attendance, I do notice who doesn’t show up on a regular basis, and missing class will not help you.

When life starts throwing curveballs at you, and it begins to get in the way of your learning, please let me know. Don’t wait until after an assignment is due to come to me and raise issues.

After the fact it is an excuse, beforehand it is a reason.

My job is to help you learn. To do whatever it takes to make that happen.

If a topic doesn’t make sense or you are struggling you need to let me know.

I’m an email or text away, and my door is always open to help you if you ask for it.

I can’t tell if a bad homework assignment is you being lazy or being confused unless we talk about it beforehand. Please don’t ever hesitate to speak to me about struggles you are having. I don’t need to know the details of what is happening outside of the classroom, but knowing that you are going through something helps me try to help you.

One last thing you need to know is that I was not a great student. I procrastinated, looked for the shortcuts and even overslept and missed the first half of a final exam once. Because of this, I have no tolerance for trying to get around the system, cheating or any form of plagiarism. If something feels off, I will double check it and verify.

I love teaching. It is how I hope to spend the final block of my career, and you are part of that.

I want you to learn and will do whatever I can to make that happen. My office door and my inbox are forever open to any of my students.

I want you to earn a good grade in my class and be successful in whatever career you choose. If there is ever anything, I can do to help from the moment you first sit down in my classroom to years down the road I will do so.

It is an honor to teach you, and I’m thankful every day that I’ve been given a chance to do so.

Make it a great day.

- Professor Chapman

Watching a new team come together, gel and start delivering results feels excellent.

Throughout my career, I’ve been lucky to be a manager or mentor for younger staff multiple times, and I’ve always found it rewarding.

In previous posts, I’ve shared how unique our Wheaton Innovates (WiN) Team is. These seven students are majoring in a variety of topics from economics to creative writing. Before this summer, most of them might not have considered a career in any type of consulting and yet this summer that is the type of work they are doing.

This week the first two projects were completed for our MassChallenge clients.

The first was a quick re-edit of an overview video for LuminDx who are hoping to help patients and physicians address challenging skin diseases using artificial intelligence.

The client had all the footage they needed but wanted it edited down to a short and fine-tuned overview video.

The second was for Candorful, who work with veterans to prepare for civilian job interviews.

They needed an original video that could play at the MassChallenge Showcase on their table. Something that could loop and give an overview of their services if the founders were busy talking to people.

Both of these projects had tight deadlines, and the students stepped up to make them happen. In both cases, the clients were delighted with the results and hoped to work with us again before the end of the summer.

While these projects were going on, our work request form kept pinging us with new requests. As a team, we decided it was time to pause requests until we delivered on the variety of projects that we had already agreed to take on.

Each member of the team is the project manager for several different companies and member of multiple other projects. While each student has individual strengths, they are all learning new skills as they apprentice under and shadow more experienced students.

It is fun to watch someone set up their first shot on a video camera or to brainstorm a social media strategy. They’ve all learned that one of the hardest tasks in consulting is managing clients and their expectations.

This morning we had a status meeting, and it was fun to see how comfortable the team has grown with each other. Joking and challenging each other. Not being afraid to share an “out there” idea, when a few weeks ago they might have hesitated.

With so many projects going on, I’m trying to help and mentor as much as possible while allowing each student to grow and learn by doing the work. So far, they’ve done great, and I have no doubt they will continue to do so.

First Week Working with the MassChallenge Finalists — A Recap of the Wheaton Innovates (WiN) Team Experience

You can never know someone’s work ethic before you dive into the trenches with them.

This past week, my team of Wheaton College Students went from the safety of our campus to the reality of the Boston start-up scene at MassChallenge.

As I sat in the creeping traffic, I wondered how they would all do. Some people need their own space. Others crave stability in their schedules. Not everyone can handle last-minute meetings, shuffling schedules and demanding clients. I had faith in my team, but now it was time to go to work.

Before the students arrived, I went up to check out the space and make sure things were ready for our arrival. On the elevator ride, I said good morning to the woman riding to the same floor as I was. As soon as I finished telling her about the team she said, “We have to work together.” and in a moment we had our first client.

It is a good lesson for everyone. Say hi to people. Introduce yourself. You never know who is waiting in line for coffee with you, riding an elevator with or sitting next to on a plane. A simple “good morning” can lead to amazing things, but you’ll never know if you don’t say it.

Once everyone arrived, we were given a tour of the MassChallenge office. It is a sweeping, open floor environment. Long community tables, brightly colored conference rooms, a maker space, kitchen full of goodies and an event space complete with a garage door to close it off when needed.

I had fun watching the students react to everything and later as I talked to them about their first day I heard everything from “wow, this is huge” to “I thought there would be more suits.” For some of them, this was their first day ever of work.

Once we got settled in, the team broke up into pairs and began going around and introducing themselves, the team and our services. We had created a flyer that explained in detail what we were about and how long we would be available to work on projects. The founders were told that to request our services all they had to do was fill out an online form we had set up.

Selling yourself is never an easy task. Personally, I’m horrible at it. Some of the students were naturals at sales and I made a point to mention that to them. It is a skill that not everyone possesses and it is a critical tool towards being successful in whatever career you choose.

By lunchtime, I broke the news to the team that we already had five companies requesting our services. By the end of the day, it would be up to eleven. As I type this, it is up to twenty-three in total.

We divided up the projects based on who was interested and assigned a project lead to each of them. This student’s role would include being the point of contact for the client and to run the requirements gathering meeting.

Our plan was to have meetings with all potential clients and then at the end of the week to sit down and go through all of them to determine which ones we had the time, skills and desire to work with.

I’m personally excited to share that one of the companies I hoped we would get a chance to work with, Collettey’s Cookies, filled out our form.

A few weeks back, I had seen a news story about Collette Divitto, who after years of not being hired because of her Down Syndrome decided to start her own company. Now, she is taking meetings around the world and making not just tasty cookies, but job opportunities.

She is an inspiring young woman CEO and I’m proud that we will be working with her and her company this summer. Oh, and if you are curious about her cookies, they live up to their name. The whole team agreed they are amazing cookies.

Remember that woman on the elevator? Her name is Pat and she is the Co-Founder of Candorful, who are working to teach interview skills to veterans.

They were the first client meeting we had and the work they hoped to have done had a very tight timeline. They were a perfect teaching example for the team and we talked a lot about how the meeting went, how hard it can be to say no and how to proceed.

I’m proud to say the students have already filmed, edited and delivered a rough cut of their needed overview video. That is exciting!

To celebrate the work kickoff, I took the team out to dinner. We laughed, shared stories and enjoyed some great seafood. It was nice to spend time outside of the office and classroom with these students and see them more relaxed.

As a team, they’ve really come together nicely. At the end of the week, the project leads briefed the team on their meetings. As a group, we decided which projects we were going to move forward with and which ones we would have to pass on.

The students are going to be working on a variety of projects including branding and marketing strategies, creating video and photography marketing elements, creative brainstorming, web site development and content creation. If this isn’t experiential learning, I don’t know what is.

This week we are off for the 4th of July holiday, but I know several students are still working on setting up meetings and learning new skills on their own to prepare for the client work.

When we all return, the month of hard work begins. Hope the team is as excited as I am.

The classroom instruction is done. Now the Wheaton Innovates (WiN) Team heads into the field.

There comes a time with every team when you have to stop coaching, teaching or drilling and kick them out of the safety of the nest and see if they can fly. As I write this, that is where we are with the Wheaton Innovates (WiN) Team.

I’m sitting outside of the Innovation and Design Building in Boston waiting for them to arrive. To see how well they planned out their morning commute. I’ll always believe that “early is on time and on time is late” so we will see if they took that to heart when I taught it to them.

The month of instructional time on campus has come to an end and the final week was a fun one.

We started it off with my friend Sarah Francomano coming in and teaching them a crash course in media training.

Her years of experience was shared in an open conversation with the students and several of them were excited to connect with her afterward for possible future work and guidance.

Having only taught at Wheaton College for a single semester, there is still a number of faculty and staff I have yet to meet.

Patrick Johnson is an Assistant Professor of FIlmmaking and offered to give us access to the school’s filmmaking gear and to specifically walk us through using the Orah 4i camera and how we might use it to shoot 360-degree videos.

It was fun to watch the students who had not ever used this sort of gear before getting full of excitement and wanting to learn more. My mind was a bit shook when I had to show one how to use a zoom on a standard DSLR camera as they had only taken photos on their phone before.

We decided that the next lesson to learn was the art of shooting interviews. A student member of the team took the lead and walked us through setting up lights, how to focus properly and the basics of shooting these kinds of videos.

To put into practice what they learned, we went out on campus and filmed a few interviews with members of the team. They quickly learned the “fun” of trying to film videos on a busy campus with landscapers, campers and other distractions causing the starting and stopping of videos.

The team was eager to do a proof of concept video for Wheaton’s marketing team for a virtual tour of the campus. They decided that the library lobby would be the optimal place to see what could be done and we quickly learned that this new media format comes with a set of challenges all it’s own.

We were all excited by the possibilities that this sort of medium opens and had a good conversation about where and when we might be able to use it for our MassChallenge clients.

The team has arrived, so I should wrap up this post.

Today, I get to see how they perform as a team and selling our services. I believe I’ve taught them well, but now the work begins and I’ll find out for sure.

No matter what course I’m teaching, I always try to mix in life and career advice into my lessons.

You won’t see me highlight these on the whiteboard with a call out, but I tend to mix them in where appropriate. Caring for my students beyond their test scores is in my DNA, and thus I hope each of them works hard and achieves their goals in life.

That is how I’m approaching this summer with the WiN Team at Wheaton College.

We might only have this summer together, but I’m working hard to build a foundation in each of these students that will help them throughout their careers. They may not realize why I’m teaching them some of the topics and lessons that I am, but the hope is at some point down the road they are going to have a lightbulb moment and think, “Ahhh…So that is why Professor Chapman taught us that!”

Our week began focusing on our LinkedIn profiles.

Each student had one in various states of completion. The goal was to accurately illustrate what they were doing this summer on their profiles and to make sure they knew how to utilize the network to find jobs and network with other people. We also covered some of my best practices including my advice to act like a human and not use their automation tools.

Also, since I love taking portraits and another member of the team loves photography, we went out on campus to make sure that each student had a professional headshot. I loved that my style and the students were completely different so now each student has several options to choose from.

Plus, we knew that we needed a team photo for our marketing materials. We decided to take a “professional” one and then a more fun one. Which do you like better?

I decided to use one of my lectures from the Managerial Communications course I taught at Bentley University on writing for business and updated it for the team.

To put into practice what they had learned, I had them split up into teams of two. The goal was for each group to write ten different tweets for DropZone For Veteransand then we would mix them all and edit/critique them as a team.

The students quickly learned that while tweeting is not hard, writing multiple tweets for a company without saying the same thing over and over is harder than it sounds.

I was proud to see that they took into consideration the audience they were trying to reach, sharing things they hoped would be retweeted and pulling quotes from the company founder Courtney Wilson who also happens to be the Entrepreneur in Residence at Wheaton College. Be sure to follow @DropZoneForVets on Twitter to see their work and find out more about this needed company.

Our team has come together and gelled nicely. You never know when you bring together such a diverse group of students how it is going to go, but these seven have genuinely impressed me.

To test the team further, I decided to give them their first project without me.

The assignment was to create a two-sided, full-color flyer to advertise the team and our services to everyone at MassChallenge. They also needed to come up with 2–3 short paragraphs that could go into an email to market ourselves.

I told them that I was reachable by phone or email, but they were to figure this out and deliver to me when they felt good about it. While the final product isn’t complete yet (lots of little tweaks here and there), the first few drafts were well done and showcased to me that their writing, marketing, and communication skills are exceptional. Plus, I loved how they used the photographs we took earlier in the week and incorporated them in the flyer.

One more week on campus and then we head down to MassChallenge.

There is a wide range of emotions flowing through me right now, but in the end, it will be nothing more than another first day of work. This is such a fantastic opportunity for the students, and I’m having a great time being part of it.

Hope you’ve enjoyed following along with my posts.

This post is part of a multi-article series documenting my summer spent with a team of seven Wheaton College students and evolving them into a creative consulting agency to work on projects with the 2018 cohort of startup companies at MassChallenge in Boston.

Week 2 With the Win Team

Starting a new venture with students two weeks into what is supposed to be their summer break is tough. The last place they want to be is back in a classroom, and while I need to teach them a variety of skills, I also want to make sure they are having fun, gelling as a team and learning all at the same time.

Managing the MassChallenge partnership for Wheaton College is a challenging one. I purposely chose students from a variety of majors. Each of them brings different pieces of experience to the table and part of my job is figuring out how to put all of them together into a finished puzzle.

I chose to start the week with an exercise I do in any marketing course I teach to help me gauge the student’s knowledge of the digital marketing landscape.

The students choose a consumer product that we are going to sell, and then we step through all the things we need to create and manage to be successful. This time on the merry-go-round they decided that we were going to be making and selling “sustainable silly string.”

On our whiteboard, we walked through our needs for a website, social media accounts, and a successful supply chain. The talk quickly switched to tactics, stunts and other ways we were going to create content to help raise awareness and market our product.

As I hoped, there were many detours into specific topics during this exercise. Discussions happened around if we were going to manufacture overseas or find a way to make it “American-Made.” They loved the idea of showing off the product at farmer’s markets and other events, but I forced them to come up with ways that we’d sell our product with these stunts.

The purpose of this exercise is two-fold. First, it gets the students active and engaged. A perfect way to start off the day and wake their minds up. Second, it highlights areas that they need to learn. A big revelation is that none of them knew how press releases worked and why they can be helpful. This will undoubtedly be an upcoming lesson.

On top of learning from me, the intern team from the WiN Hub across campus joined us so that one of them could give a presentation on HubSpot and what inbound marketing is all about. Students sharing knowledge with other students is always beneficial when it can happen.

The other major topics of the week focused on content marketing and influencer engagement. Two items I know a lot about from years of experience.

It is refreshing to take topics that I know so well and expose new minds to them. The questions that arise and the discussions that follow. Me teaching the students, but them also opening my eyes to new creators/influencers/brands that I have never heard of.

To put into practice what they learned, I split the group into two teams and gave them a couple of hours to go away and brainstorm what kind of influencer campaign we might be able to do for the Mexico Tourism Board. They had to come up with five individuals that they’d want to approach to take part in the campaign and to justify their choices.

They came back with a variety of ideas and individuals. I smiled as I watched them take what they had learned moments ago and showed me that they were listening and learning. We even receieved a helpful reply from the tourism board on Twitter.

To end our week, we had a guest lecture. Gene Begin is the Vice President of Marketing & Communications at Wheaton College and an old friend of mine.

He shared the process his team uses when working with clients to take their ideas and make them a reality. I want these students to hear from other people out in the field doing the work. Understanding how a department at Wheaton College requests a new brochure, video or other creative asset and the steps that Gene and his team take to ensure that everyone is happy will be beneficial when the team begins working with clients at MassChallenge.

Thank you, Gene, for taking time out of your busy schedule to share your expert knowledge with the team (and bringing some fun branded schwag for them and me too).

Sitting here with my coffee looking back at the week, we accomplished a ton. It feels good to see the team coming together and their confidence building.

The team’s homework for the weekend is to make sure that their LinkedIn profiles are up to date. We are going to be taking new headshots and diving into each of them to make improvements. Mine certainly needs a refresh, so I’m looking forward to their suggestions.

I may have thrown them into the deep end of the pool, but I have confidence that they’ll be swimming laps in no time.

Life is too short, not to try the things that scare you the most.

So, when I was asked what I thought about the idea of taking a handful of Wheaton College students and turning them into a strategic consulting team that would work with the 2018 Boston cohort of MassChallenge startups over the course of this summer I jumped at the opportunity.

​Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts consists of 1700 liberal arts and science students creating innovative solutions to big challenges and acting on them.

I joined Wheaton this past semester as a visiting instructor for the business and management program. The program was added in 2013 and has since grown to be one of the most popular majors. Students can choose from more than 100 majors, and minors at Wheaton and the rigorous academic learning is accompanied by experiential opportunities outside the classroom.

One such example is this partnership with MassChallenge that is entering its third year.

Opportunities like this did not exist for me as a college student, and more schools need to take the learning beyond their classrooms to stay relevant and needed for future generations of students. Higher education administrators please take note.

Wheaton College has committed to innovation and social entrepreneurship. This was one of their biggest strength that got my attention when I was first approached about teaching a class there.

With a recent $10M gift to build out the program even further, I’m excited to be a small part of the excitement that is going on with the school and their Wheaton Innovates Now (WIN) program.

This week we kicked off the training portion of the program with a focus on the team getting to know one another. Their first assignment after I taught them how to conduct interviews for requirements gathering was to team up with someone they did not know and interview them.

Then they each built a quick presentation and gave it to the group so that we could all learn new things about one another. I felt it was a perfect way to teach a skill and then put it into practice immediately.

When picking the team, I took special care to ensure that it was diverse in every way possible. That way the ideas would be sure to flow from all directions. We have students from as far away as Guatemala, China and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. There are creative writing, economics, film and business majors. I am very happy with the team of seven that has been assembled.

I plan to write up a weekly post sharing the process. Both as a tool to help others, but also to support me so that I can look back at the end and think about ways it could be improved. You can also follow along on Twitter or Instagram if you crave more.

Yesterday, the goal was to teach them the definitions of common business and marketing terminology. Explaining what a “call to action” is and why it is important to content that companies create. The difference between a “pay per click” advertisement and a “cost per impression.”

What I thought would take a couple of hours, sprouted a variety of conversations and rabbit holes that we went down and we didn’t get to my planned second topic for the day.

Some of the topics that came up and we dove into discussing included:

• How someone registers a domain name and why I have so many of them?
• An excellent explanation video on dark patterns that a member of the team thought we’d benefit from.
• If Solo or Deadpool 2 lived up to our expectations?
• The importance of disclosure when it comes to sharing anything a company gives you.
• Who is Casey Neistat?
• How translation rights work for books.

Stay tuned as the team comes together and begins to take what I teach in the classroom and put it into practice with a variety of different clients. We’ve only got a few weeks together in a classroom, so there is plenty of work to do.

What do you believe are the essential skills these students need to learn to be a successful consulting agency? I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions so that these students gain as much experience as possible.

Every semester I spend in a classroom reminds me how much I love teaching students.

Spring semester at Wheaton College is officially over.

It was an eye-opening semester for me in multiple positive ways.

I was hired to teach Marketing, and while I’ve spent most of my career in the space, it was fun to go back to a textbook and the fundamentals. At the last moment, I was asked to teach a second class, and that was where a lot of the surprises came from.

The Business and Management major is one of the newest ones at the school, and it has quickly become a popular one. Many students who are majoring in other things realize that having a minor in business is a smart idea in today’s world.

My second class was Business Fundamentals, and it was filled with a variety of students testing the waters of business. I had an absolute blast teaching it.

I wasn’t prepared for how different it would be teaching courses at a liberal arts school compared to when I’m teaching at Bentley University which is one of the top business schools in the country.

The students are different. Their questions from all corners. It was challenging but in the best possible way.

Plus, my mind has always been wired more towards the liberal arts side. I was a theater kid at a business school. I’ll always use my creative side more than my analytical.

While I’m sure some professors don’t enjoy teaching the 101 level courses, I hope I get a chance to teach Business Fundamentals again. Setting a foundation for how a business of any kind is run was a damn good feeling. Plus, I had several friends come in and guest lecture with the goal of exposing the students to a variety of different types of businesses.

What I wasn’t prepared to find when I started this semester was such a welcoming community at Wheaton. I’ve gotten to know so many different people around campus and love the direction that they are going. Attending my first faculty meetings, I felt like I was pulling back the curtain on a piece of the Higher Education puzzle that I didn’t know about yet and I have an infinite list of thoughts.

Wheaton College is evolving as any school should always be striving to do. With such a deep-rooted history and a bright, innovative future, I can’t wait to see what happens. I hope I can be part of it.

Thank you to all of my students who I know are going to do amazing things in the world. Future dentists, cosmetic packaging designers, music marketing professionals, artificial intelligence developers and a list of jobs we can’t even imagine yet.

Being an Adjunct Professor means you never know what the next semester is going to hold. Maybe I’ll be teaching at Wheaton? Maybe I’ll be at Bentley? Might not be at either. Right now I have no idea.

This semester did cement for me that I want my future to be in a classroom. For a long time the signs have been pointing me in that direction, but I believe that the next phase of my career is that of a teacher and I need to figure out how to make it a fulltime part of my life so that I can concentrate 100% on the students and not be struggling to find work while trying to do best by them.

The search for a college that will allow me to be a full-time member of their community continues.