By Laura Acuff, Opinion Editor
As a new facet of this year’s Summit, well-known speakers Rubel Shelly, Rick Atchley and Jeff Walling will present “Highlight Classes” on topics including atheism, church orthodoxy and relationships at 1:30 p.m. Monday through Wednesday.
“Highlight classes just mean ‘of interest’ speakers,” said Brady Bryce, director of ministry events. “Students told us [of] several ministers or preachers that they really liked hearing from, so rather than putting one of them opposite a lesser-known faculty member or an unknown student who might be presenting, we put those three guys-Jeff Walling, Rubal Shelly and Rick Atchley-in one time slot.”
The Highlight Classes feature several potentially controversial topics, but Tom Sheldon, junior psychology major from Colorado Springs, who participated in leading a session on PostSecret during last year’s Lectureship, said controversial topics can lead to valuable discussion.
“I think it’s great,” Sheldon said. “I’ve always thought that we should be more open with those kinds of things instead of trying to suppress what people think.”
While Highlight Classes are not as specifically geared toward students as the actual student track, Sheldon said he believed both older and younger generations might benefit through attendance. “I definitely think both can benefit,” Sheldon said. “It would be really great to have students actually go to some of these things. We’ll see if that happens this year.”
With Summit moving toward a more studentoriented function this year, Bryce also said he hoped for increased student involvement. But, in the end, what students take away from the annual conference depends on the individual.
“It’s up to them,” Bryce said. “I’m kind of excited about what I’ve been hearing from students about how they like the diversity of people that are coming, the topics that they hear, but then when the event comes, you’ve got to kind of see how it goes.”
Sheldon said he believes the relevancy of topics alone will interest more students. “I don’t know that the fact that they’re controversial would be the draw, just the fact that they’re relative,” Sheldon said. “Unfortunately, things that are actually relative to our lives are usually controversial.”
