Kicklighter gives speech as favorite professor

By Amy Weaver

Published: April 3, 2008

When Dr. Joe Kicklighter talks, people listen.

A couple hundred students still enroll in his history class at Auburn University every year, but some attend simply to hear him speak.

No one can say exactly what it is, but he’s had this kind of influence since he arrived on the Plains 33 years ago.

When word got out that the beloved professor would be delivering the inaugural “Final Lecture” Thursday on campus, Andy Newton, president of Omicron Delta Kappa, Auburn’s leadership honor society, said a number of alumni inquired about making sure the event would be recorded since they could not attend. A crowd, mostly of students, nonetheless filed into the Foy Union ballroom, not for a grade, but to listen to a special member of the Auburn family.

The Final Lecture is a new program sponsored by the Student Government Association, Omicron Delta Kappa and Mortar Board as an opportunity for the senior class to recognize a professor they feel is the most outstanding teacher. Student leaders narrowed down a wide pool of nominees to five professors, then juniors and seniors across campus voted for Kicklighter to deliver the inaugural lecture.

Kicklighter, 62, said he’s earned a lot of awards in his time — most notably, Auburn’s highest faculty honor, the Gerald and Emily Leischuck Endowed Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2006 — but this honor may surpass them all. He called it a “joy beyond measure” to be recognized by students in this fashion.

“There’s nothing like being honored by the ones you serve,” he said.

Newton, who will graduate next month, said he’s never had Kicklighter as a teacher, but is not surprised he’s a favorite of current and former students alike, based simply on what he’s heard from them.
“It makes us very proud to have him here,” he said.

Kicklighter is humbled with every honor that focuses on the work he has done, but he would much rather focus on the future.

He didn’t get into academics for the accolades anyway, but to have an impact on others, he said.

He doesn’t think he’s anything special or brilliant, but rather “pretty intelligent.” And he believes he has a gift, a passion to teach, that he first discovered back in the ninth grade when he taught others how to play cards. Teaching is work, but it’s work with a purpose and he loves it with every fiber of his being.

“It is your challenge as future alumni to find your passion,” he said. “Work should never be about a paycheck and medical coverage.”

| 737-2534