Faculty Spotlight: Matt Smith-Lahrman

It’s always a challenge to see a student struggling, especially when what they are struggling with is outside of the classroom. Dr. Smith-Lahrman struggles when seeing students like this because he wants to help them, but it’s not really his place as a professor. It’s hard sometimes to not see or treat students like your kids, especially in Dr. Smith-lahrman’s case where most students are now his kids’ age. But, he believes it is very important to keep a barrier between being a student’s friend or being their professor. It can be a challenge to do because it is important to get to know your students as a professor. But, you can’t care too much to the point that it is inappropriate.

Then, of course, there are times where professors will get a student that just really, really doesn’t like them. There was even been an instance in the past where he had to notify the campus police because a student had made threats against him after he gave them a bad grade on an assignment. But Dr. Smith-Lahrman admits that this type of situation is a very rare thing.

Whereas both of the previous examples come from situations outside of the class, there is still a fair share of challenges professors face inside the classroom. Sometimes students just don’t get the materials, which can be especially difficult when the subject is their major, and they just aren’t progressing as much as they need to be. In that situation, Dr. Smith-Lahrman takes the time to reach out to them, connect with them, and help to find a way to work through their problems with them.

Introduction to Sociology is one of Dr. Smith-Lahrman’s favorite classes, as it is the introduction for students into all areas of sociology. The class covers a variety of sociology topics and theories, and while it’s a lot to cover in a single class, it’s a lot of fun. When it gets to sociology majors, Dr. Smith-Lahrman enjoys teaching social psychology and qualitative research methods. He also teaches a class every other year called the Sociology of Rock Music, which is an especially fun topic considering his own hobbies outside of the classroom.

One of Dr. Smith-Lahrman’s favorite experiences he has with students is when they go and present their research at a conference. For example, DSU has the Regional Symposium for Research, Innovation, and Creativity every April, which is a great way for students to present their research. This year specifically, we had UCUR (the Utah Conference on Undergraduate Research) being hosted here for students to participate in. It’s always fun for Dr. Smith-Lahrman to see students expand their knowledge beyond the classroom. As well as this, the students in the sociology program also are required to take a capstone class where they write an article. Dr. Smith-Lahrman explains that it is amazing as a professor to be able to see a student’s journey in education through the course. He can remember where they started and where their writing and thinking skills were at when they began in the program and can compare them to their final paper to see how far they have come. The sociology program is still a pretty small and tight-knit program, and is only in its fifth year, so every year, he sends out a survey to the alumni of the program, asking them what they’re doing and how they’re applying their degree outside of school. They’ve had one student who started their own non-profit organization, and there are many who have gone on to grad school. There’s even one student who became a realtor, but his sociology helps him out a lot with being a successful salesman.

Outside of the classroom, Matt enjoys hiking with his wife, and while they’re not avid or hard-core, it’s an enjoyable hobby. He enjoys rock n’ roll and collects vinyl records and vinyl CDs. He also really likes aquariums and loves tropical fish, as well as loves reading in his free time. Some fun facts about Dr. Smith-Lahrman are that he hasn’t cut his hair since the beginning of the pandemic, he tries his best to be vegan, and he’s a Meathead (a fan of the rock and roll band the Meat Puppets).

Dr. Smith-Lahrman grew up in California, in an area of San Diego called Bonita. He attended college at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona for both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. For his PhD, he attended Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois. After graduating, he lived one year in Tucson, Arizona, which is where his wife is from, and they then eventually came to St George.  They ended up moving because of the job offer and didn’t know anything about the area before coming here, aside from a rafting trip to Utah Matt had taken to Utah prior to the job acceptance. However, he has lived here longer than he has lived in any place during his life. It’s a great outdoor place, and while it is missing some of the big city stuff that Dr. Smith-Lahrman had growing up, he likes it overall.

Reading is Dr. Smith-Lahrman’s greatest resource. He can study anything and everything that people do as a sociologist, and as such, reading is a great place to gather this information. He reads not only sociology texts but fiction, websites, newspapers, other disciplines, and anything else that has to do with what people do. It’s all the information that will help him teach and improve. In sociology, he wants to know what people are doing, and as such, it is important to gather a variety of information from as many places as possible.

Dr. Smith-Lahrman’s fellow faculty are an important resource to him. In the McDonald building where he spends the majority of his time, there are some great neighboring professors, like Dr. McLeod, Joe Green, Dr. Yildiz, who are there to discuss with Dr. Smith-lahrman between classes about anything and everything. He loves to hear their ideas and have these in-depth discussions. Interacting with other people is a great resource!

One of the things that Dr. Smith-Lahrman really likes about teaching is the age group of traditional students. It’s a great time in life for students to learn. Many of them are leaving home for the first time, and as such, they aren’t tied down or constrained, they have great ideas about the world, and they are just starting to have room to think for themselves. To these students, everything is fair game, which is very exciting to Dr. Smith-Lahrman. This attitude really helps him to stay younger in thinking. As well as this, the university isn’t high school, so he doesn’t have to deal with disciplining them in the same way as a high school teacher has to.