Every year, the annual Parker History Lecture sees a distinguished expert come to the school and deliver a lecture about an important era of history. In this year’s lecture in an upper school assembly, author and professor Dr. Julian Zelizer, presented “The Reagan Revolution,” in which he discussed the reorganization of American politics after the presidential election of 1980.
The lecture saw mixed reactions from the student body. Many students found the lecture riveting, while others also found it difficult to connect or engage with.
Fifth Former Mason Wiegand found the lecture to be a mix of both.
“I wasn’t overly interested or bored in the assembly. The topic chosen was something I knew very little about, so diving into the Reagan administration was pretty interesting,” Wiegand said. “But there were no deep lessons or existential questions given to the audience like last year. I felt informed, but not moved.”
Sixth Former Reilly Pryma has similar mixed feelings about the lecture’s content.
“The topic chosen was something I knew very little about, so diving into the Reagan administration was pretty interesting.”
Reilly Pryma ’24
“I wasn’t necessarily bored by it. I’d say he definitely excluded a lot of the nasty aspects of Reagan, like prison labor, the tax cuts for the wealthy in general, how horrible it was for people,” Pryma said. “My general takeaway was that he offered some very interesting takes on Reagan, but I wouldn’t say it was quite complete.”
Some students had trouble connecting with the material.
“I honestly had trouble focusing on the lecture,” Fifth Former Phineas Manogue said. “For what most of the thing was about, I only remember the ‘Reagan Revolution,’ but I forget what that means.”
Some students found the questions asked more interesting than the lecture itself.
“I think my favorite part of this year was actually the Q&A following the assembly,” Sixth Former Ryan Brewington said. “One student asked Dr. Zelizer about how Former President Reagan’s mass dismissal of air traffic workers affected Reagan running for his second term, to which Dr. Zelizer told us that his students were also very interested in Reagan’s actions towards airline workers on strike.”
Similarly, Pryma found the lunch session to be the most notable moment of the lecture, as Dr. Zelizer touched on many points Pryma found to be most interesting. The Q&A offered a more interactive version of the material.
“He did sort of talk about the divisions within both parties and really how unstable they are due to just the fact that parties are sort of artificial constructs, but also the sort of momentum and inertia in such an establishment,” Pryma said. “It’s basically almost like its own mini government. I thought that was definitely sort of an interesting moment.”
Fifth Former Michael Bartholdson wonders if the style of the presentation correlated with the difficulties in student engagement.
“[The lecture style] appeals to a lot of students, but it also disconnects students who zone out,” Bartholdson said. “I think they could experiment with more interactive presentations.”
Pryma agrees.
“I mean, lectures have their place. Do I think it’s the most beneficial form of presentation?” Pryma said. “No. The more audience interaction you have, the more people are going to take away. The more people take away, the more useful it’s going to be.”
Wiegand disagrees.
“I think a lecture style is the best way to conduct a speech like this,” Wiegand said. “Ultimately, the goal of the lecturer is to present information and their interpretation of the information. In giving a lecture, they portray the information better than any other form of presentation.”
Wiegand feels the lecture did what it was supposed to do.
“The presentation came off as a true college lecture that required a level of interest from the audience that many people didn’t have.”
Mason wiegand ’25
“The presentation came off as a true college lecture that required a level of interest from the audience that many people didn’t have,” Wiegand said. “There were no hot takes or spicy topics. It was just a well-done presentation, and that’s all.”
Brewington agrees.
“I think these lectures provide a view into real-world college lectures, and I think that’s very valuable,” Brewington said. “I’ll definitely be attending lectures similar to these in college.”
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