DCIT 55

Web Development

The Last Lecture

By
Randy Pausch

Nicole J. Montecalvo
BSCS 3-1
200713310

Mr. Steve Poniente

September 29, 2010

About the Last Lecture

On September 18, 2007, computer science professor Randy Pausch stepped in front of an
audience of 400 people at Carnegie Mellon University to deliver a last lecture called “Really
Achieving Your Childhood Dreams.” With slides of his CT scans beaming out to the audience,
Randy told his audience about the cancer that is devouring his pancreas and that will claim his
life in a matter of months. On the stage that day, Randy was youthful, energetic, handsome, often
cheerfully, darkly funny. He seemed invincible. But this was a brief moment, as he himself
acknowledged.

Randy’s lecture has become a phenomenon, as has the book he wrote based on the same
principles, celebrating the dreams we all strive to make realities. Sadly, Randy lost his battle to
pancreatic cancer on July 25th, 2008, but his legacy will continue to inspire us all, for
generations to come.

The poster for Randy Pausch’s “The Last Lecture”.

Biography of Randy Pausch

 Randy Pausch (October 23, 1960 – July 25, 2008) was a professor of Computer Science,
Human Computer Interaction, and Design at Carnegie
Mellon University (CMU) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

He is known for the creation of Alice software

project (Alice is an innovative 3-D environment that
teaches programming to young people via storytelling and
interactive game-playing). He also co-founded The
Entertainment Technology Center at Carnegie Mellon with
Don Marinelli. (ETC is the premier professional graduate
program for interactive entertainment as it is applies across
a variety of fields). He is also a part of the Virtual Reality
Research with Disney Imagineers. He also co-authored a
book called The Last Lecture on the same theme, which Randy Pausch
became a New York Times best-seller.

Pausch receive notable awards such as Karl V. Karlstrom Outstanding Educator Award,
ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education and Award for Outstanding
Contributions to Computer Science Education
Fellow of the ACM.

Reaction and Discussion

 The story of Randy Pausch’s life from the beginning up to his lost battle with pancreatic
cancer is very inspirational. He as a young kid dreaming to be a professional American football
player was somewhat the same with other children’s dreams. Simple yet seems to be impossible.
Pausch realizing that being a National Football Player is far from his capacity he did not lose
hope or focus in life but instead put his thoughts with things he desired of doing or being a part
with.

“Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you wanted.”

In achieving your goals and dreams in life you need to have hard work and a lot of hard
work. Obstacles, frustration, rejection and even stress are all there to show us how badly we want
these things. It goes with the saying in economics that there is no such thing as free lunch, we
need to work for it before succeeding.

“Brick walls are there for a reason: they let us prove how badly we want things.”

Having fun, showing gratitude, telling the truth, exercising a good apology and waiting
for other people to open up according to Pausch is needed to achieve or dreams. This words are
simple to understand yet hard to master but when achieve will not only make you successful but
also a better person.
The talk is not only about achieving your childhood dreams but much broader than that. It
is about living your life the right way and the karma will come back to you in the form of
success. Being a better person character wise will help us adjust with other people. Having the
positive outlook in life will effect in our approaches with things. Hard work and courage is the
key to develop skills valuable to big companies.
I was a bit emotional when Pausch said that the talk is not directly intended to inspire
people but is for his three young kids that he will be living and in the near future might watch
this video..
We need an outlook like Randy Pausch in every one of us.