Our final speaker for Honors Forum Part II was Dr. Morris, a former UNA Economics teacher (35 years!) who currently serves as a City Council member for the city of Florence. He introduced his current occupation by admitting he worked very many hours with minimal pay. When I hear the words "City Council," it immediately symbolizes the idea of empowerment for me; this is because I witnessed the successful city council election of an 18-year old who had just recently graduated from my high school shortly after my father's term as mayor.
Feats like this remind me that even though I am a young adult, with the right goals, I can make a difference in my community (which has only been affirmed by the speakers from this Forum!) Dr. Morris even reaffirmed that this is possible in a smaller community when he shared that although he grew up in large cities and moved every year from kindergarten to his senior year of high school, he chose Florence, Alabama as his permanent residence in 1974.
One of the most impressive things about Dr. Morris was the discussion of the Raymond Isbell Scholarship he helped create, in which ten faculty members who are retiring agree to teach an additional year with no salary. In turn, their salary serves as funding for this scholarship program, ultimately benefitting students just like us.
He also shared how his duties paralleled with the enrichment of the community and urged us to "contribute to its better quality of life." Just voting in elections (although that is admirable and should be encouraged) doesn't make or maintain Florence as a "fine place to live, work, or play." City council members don't simply vote on issues though; they are left with the ultimate responsibility to decide on major decisions like whether or not Florence should get a Wal-Mart supercenter (and probably upset the "mom-and-pop" store owners) or whether or not the city should pay an external company to ship out garbage.
It was obvious how much Dr. Morris took pride in both his job and UNA as he spoke with such enthuasiasm about the city council position and referred to UNA as "his school" and its attendees as "his students." He even shared with us his personal budget plan he used for both of his sons, entitled, "How to Be a Millionaire Without Winning the Lottery."
Overall, Dr. Morris has probably been my favorite speaker from our forums...I guess he was a great one to end on! Not only was Dr. Morris incredibly down-to-earth, but he was also very honest and open in sharing with us that it would be harder to help someone else if we weren't mentally or fiscally stronger. I've taken this to heart over the past two weeks since my recent surgery that has left me physically handicapped. I've taken a brief pause in my community service to heal, because just as Dr Morris said, "You have to love yourself first." Allowing others to help me and accepting my new, temporarily different self is a transition I'm definitely working on. However, I've learned through BOTH my volunteer and major surgery experience this semester just how lucky I truly am.
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