Randy Pausch
Pausch delivered his "Last Lecture", titled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams", at CMU on September 18, 2007. He gave an abridged version of his speech on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in October 2007. The talk was modeled after an ongoing series of lectures where top academics are asked to think deeply about what matters to them, and then give a hypothetical "final talk", with a topic such as "what wisdom would you try to impart to the world if you knew it was your last chance?" Before speaking, Pausch received a long standing ovation from a large crowd of over 400 colleagues and students. When he motioned them to sit down, saying, "Make me earn it", someone in the audience shouted back, "You did!"
Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams
This led Pausch to conduct a virtual reality class at Carnegie Mellon, to teach others and to help them realize their childhood dreams. In the course, 50 students from the university were separated into random teams of four and were each assigned a project relating to building a virtual world. Each group had two weeks to work on the project, and then presented the project to the group. The teams were then randomized again and a new project began. The project then evolved into something that people came to watch, and helped his students realize their potential. Finally, Pausch gave a few words of advice on how others could achieve their childhood dreams, and who his role models were when he was trying to do so.