(Photo Credit: Brian Egan's instructor website)
Brian Egan walks into his classroom in Mckenzie Hall, dressed to the tee in his tucked in button up shirt and LBCC faculty lanyard. Briefcase in hand, he greets his class: “Good morning all! Welcome to lucky day 13!”
Egan, who works seven jobs at any given time, was running on just two hours of sleep on this particular day. Despite his fatigue, he carried on in his usual fashion, cracking jokes and remaining enthusiastic about his favorite subject to teach: technical writing.
The technical writing class Brian offers here at LBCC is a required part of many two-year degrees. Nick Houlemard, a student of Egan's, said "I wanted to take this class from way back, but then I realized it was requirement for my degree." Nick is studying biochemistry.
Kitsey Trewin, another student currently in the class, owns a local real estate office, and wanted to take technical writing classes for personal enrichment. "I write a lot of business letters...the class will benefit me in any major I choose. At this point, I'm looking at business."
Egan begins the first class of each term by saying that his is one of the hardest classes a student will likely take in the next two years. "I struggle with the class itself because it pushes your critical thinking analysis to a new level," said student Terry Chamberlain.
Chamberlain has been enjoying the class so far, however. She said "I appreciate how he does class activities," like his infamous "Picture Password" game. In the game, one student describes an inanimate object to another person, and that person attempts to draw the object on the whiteboard without looking at it, while the whole class looks on.
“Let me fire up Mr.
Projector here, and we'll get cracking,” said Brian to his class.
It's week seven of the term, and he is introducing his students to their
final project – a technical report on a subject of their choosing.
Once he has the projector
running, Egan begins to unpack a plethora of different colors of dry
erase markers, setting them down by the whiteboard, one by one. He
then outlines his lecture as he goes, with a numbered point for each
detail he describes. Every lecture Brian gives comes complete with
illustrations on the side, neatly drawn in the hand of someone who
takes organization very seriously.
His technical writing style translates into his teaching methods, both in classes and in email correspondences. The entire class revolves around it, as he drives home his message in every way he can.
Trewin said that "[she tries] to do things perfectly, but no matter what, he gets me on something!" She was referring to one of his Egan's class related emails, in which he told Trewin to resend the email with a colon after his name instead of a comma, or suffer a reduced grade on the assignment.
While lecturing, Egan makes sure to keep the class on their toes, asking questions of the audience, playing funny videos related to the course, and cracking jokes on occasion. "Now, if you've ever read a piece of great literature - for example, one of the Twilight books..." he jokes in the midst of a class discussion on good writing.
Such wisecracking and overall Tom-foolery might not be expected of a 200-level technical writing course, but Egan believes that "the element of pleasant surprise can do a lot to make an otherwise boring class palatable."
"What is a rhetorical question?" he later asks. "Well a rhetorical question is what I just did. It's a gimmick, it's a space waster, and it drives people nuts!" He drives his point home by asking "How long should a piece of writing be in this class?" A student answers: "As long as it has to be." "Exactly!" says Brian. "It should be as long as it has to be, and not a word longer."
Houlemard stated that "[Egan's] teaching style" is his favorite part of the class, saying that "it's more about teaching you how to think."
In a later interview, Egan offered up a few useful "nuggets" of information about himself. "My teaching philosophy: It's gotta be practical, and it has to be fun. I teach absolutely nothing and I assess absolutely nothing that I don't think students will use in the next three to five years."
Egan has been teaching writing class since 1988, when the dean of the college asked him if he'd like to teach after graduation and offered him a job. His first experience with teaching, however, was at the age of nineteen, when he was in the Air Force. "By a strange twist of fate, I was asked to tutor math...so I started teaching, and I discovered I loved teaching."
Egan has been teaching at LBCC since 2009, and currently teaches two classes here. "I won't teach more than two CRNs at a time. I spend between nine and twelve hours correcting, per assignment." He later revised this comment, saying "I don't correct; I critique."
His dedication to teaching is evident. Students are encouraged to call and even text him on his cellphone at odd hours, as long as it is before 9pm. If that isn't enough, Egan is willing to meet with students at coffee shops in Corvallis and Albany to go over their work and to provide helpful suggestions.
With six other jobs and active involvement in his band, All Rights Reserved, it's a wonder he has the time to offer so much to his students. Egan thoroughly believes that "good communication skills are the most under-appreciated and valuable skill a job seeker can have," and he works hard to ensure that his students leave his class with the communication skills needed to enter the professional work force.
"I have no desire to teach any other classes besides this one. This one I believe in," said Egan.
Q and As:
Q: What are your favorite kinds of writing to read?
Brian: "Oh, I love reading. I'm big on fantasy and Sci-Fi. Game of Thrones and Stephen King are two of my favorites. I really enjoy historical fiction."
Q: What are some of your favorite things to write about?
Brian: "I know this is gonna sound really weird, but I write only when I have to. Writing is not one of my hobbies." "My art comes out in poetry, music, stained glass, and watercolors. It does not come out in writing."
Q: What is Clarity LLC?
Brian: I have my own business in mediation. I mediate divorces and business breakups. I also mediate small claims courses as a volunteer...and foreclosures as part of the state appointed mediators. I'm doing twenty to twenty five of those cases every month. I have seven jobs...with sixty to seventy hours a week between all of them."
(Photo Credit: Brian Egan's instructor website)His technical writing style translates into his teaching methods, both in classes and in email correspondences. The entire class revolves around it, as he drives home his message in every way he can.
Trewin said that "[she tries] to do things perfectly, but no matter what, he gets me on something!" She was referring to one of his Egan's class related emails, in which he told Trewin to resend the email with a colon after his name instead of a comma, or suffer a reduced grade on the assignment.
While lecturing, Egan makes sure to keep the class on their toes, asking questions of the audience, playing funny videos related to the course, and cracking jokes on occasion. "Now, if you've ever read a piece of great literature - for example, one of the Twilight books..." he jokes in the midst of a class discussion on good writing.
Such wisecracking and overall Tom-foolery might not be expected of a 200-level technical writing course, but Egan believes that "the element of pleasant surprise can do a lot to make an otherwise boring class palatable."
"What is a rhetorical question?" he later asks. "Well a rhetorical question is what I just did. It's a gimmick, it's a space waster, and it drives people nuts!" He drives his point home by asking "How long should a piece of writing be in this class?" A student answers: "As long as it has to be." "Exactly!" says Brian. "It should be as long as it has to be, and not a word longer."
Houlemard stated that "[Egan's] teaching style" is his favorite part of the class, saying that "it's more about teaching you how to think."
In a later interview, Egan offered up a few useful "nuggets" of information about himself. "My teaching philosophy: It's gotta be practical, and it has to be fun. I teach absolutely nothing and I assess absolutely nothing that I don't think students will use in the next three to five years."
Egan has been teaching writing class since 1988, when the dean of the college asked him if he'd like to teach after graduation and offered him a job. His first experience with teaching, however, was at the age of nineteen, when he was in the Air Force. "By a strange twist of fate, I was asked to tutor math...so I started teaching, and I discovered I loved teaching."
Egan has been teaching at LBCC since 2009, and currently teaches two classes here. "I won't teach more than two CRNs at a time. I spend between nine and twelve hours correcting, per assignment." He later revised this comment, saying "I don't correct; I critique."
His dedication to teaching is evident. Students are encouraged to call and even text him on his cellphone at odd hours, as long as it is before 9pm. If that isn't enough, Egan is willing to meet with students at coffee shops in Corvallis and Albany to go over their work and to provide helpful suggestions.
With six other jobs and active involvement in his band, All Rights Reserved, it's a wonder he has the time to offer so much to his students. Egan thoroughly believes that "good communication skills are the most under-appreciated and valuable skill a job seeker can have," and he works hard to ensure that his students leave his class with the communication skills needed to enter the professional work force.
"I have no desire to teach any other classes besides this one. This one I believe in," said Egan.
Q and As:
Q: What are your favorite kinds of writing to read?
Brian: "Oh, I love reading. I'm big on fantasy and Sci-Fi. Game of Thrones and Stephen King are two of my favorites. I really enjoy historical fiction."
Q: What are some of your favorite things to write about?
Brian: "I know this is gonna sound really weird, but I write only when I have to. Writing is not one of my hobbies." "My art comes out in poetry, music, stained glass, and watercolors. It does not come out in writing."
Q: What is Clarity LLC?
Brian: I have my own business in mediation. I mediate divorces and business breakups. I also mediate small claims courses as a volunteer...and foreclosures as part of the state appointed mediators. I'm doing twenty to twenty five of those cases every month. I have seven jobs...with sixty to seventy hours a week between all of them."
At a Glance:
Brian Egan
Jobs: Technical Writing Instructor at LBCC and business and marriage mediation, among other things.
Years at LBCC: 5
Education: Master's degree in Organization Development, Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering, Associate's degree in Electronics Technology.
Hobbies: Playing bass guitar with All Rights Reserved, watercolor painting, working with stained glass, poetry.
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