A radical experiment in empathy: Sam Richards at TEDx PSU

Sam Richards is a sociologist and awardwinning teacher who has been inspiring undergraduate students at Penn State since 1990. Every semester, 725 students register for his Race and Ethnic Relations course, one of the most popular classes at Penn State and the largest of its kind in the country. Through his natural ability of seeing a subject from many angles, Richards encourages students to engage more fully with the world and to think for themselves something he did not do until his third year in college. Because of his passion for challenging students to open their minds, an interviewer recently referred to him as an alarm clock for His career began at the age of 24 when he was hired to teach a cybernetics course just 15 minutes before the first class meeting. He remembers walking into the room without having had a moment to create a lesson plan and greeting his students, Welcome to the course. I m your instructor. And if you have no idea what cybernetics is, you re not alon