From his teaching methods to his appearance, Ryan Vaughan is someone you remember. He’s that funny professor who’s not afraid to be bold, but he’s also much more than that.
“Many people think of him as a fun professor, but what’s really interesting is that he can devote himself to something that’s so appealing,” said Benjamin Shuter, a senior majoring in creative writing. “He shows students that you can do what you love.”
Shuter has gotten to know Vaughan on a more personal level, as the professor is his faculty mentor. He thinks Vaughan gives a very important voice to unorthodox areas of academia.
Vaughan received his undergraduate degree in English from Le Moyne College, a small Jesuit college in Syracuse.
“It was the easiest,” Vaughan said. “HDEV wasn’t a thing yet.”
Ironically, Vaughan graduated college with a 2.4 GPA.
“I wasn’t a serious student,” Vaughan said. “I went to all the parties.”
He does, however, admit that he’s never had a drink or illegal substance in his life, something that may shock the party-going populace of Binghamton University.
After being the first person in his family to earn a college degree, he spent the next three years of his life working for his father’s pool installation company and “doing that whole suburban thing.” During that time, he married his college sweetheart.
“I was wasting, what some say, ‘a tremendous intellect,’” Vaughan said.
He enrolled in graduate school at Binghamton and “never left.” In 2006, he earned his Ph.D. in English, creative writing and media studies.
“What’s really great about this school is that you can have a creative dissertation,” Vaughan said.
His dissertation was a compilation of the creative works he had worked on during the previous five years. Since then, Vaughan has been teaching unique classes and “trying to change the world one joke at a time.”
At this point in the interview, Vaughan excused himself to “take a dump.”
Vaughan slightly regrets not having more time to dedicate to writing, but he is slowly working on a book that resembles his lectures for his television classes. He describes his lectures as his “contribution to the University” and wants to bring them to a wider audience.
Vaughan’s main goal of teaching is to make thinking a priority for people and to teach people that they can learn a tremendous amount from things they might take for granted or may have already dismissed.
Appropriately, all of his courses are in the realm of entertainment and media. He teaches pop culture-related classes like “Humor Across the Media,” “Stand-Up Nation” and “Television and American Culture.”
Eliana Horowitz, a junior majoring in psychology, took “Stand-Up Nation” last semester and is currently enrolled in “Humor Across the Media.”
“His class offers a fun and relaxing atmosphere for learning,” Horowitz said. “He gives us a new perspective on stereotypes in an accessible way, in an open environment where students don’t feel uncomfortable talking about it.”
And any student who knows Vaughan knows he constantly changes his beard style, while currently sporting a distinctive spiral design.
“I’ve done everything else I can think of,” Vaughan said. “It’s the beard of the future. Someone who wears it now must really be an idiot.”
Vaughan also likes to give back to the community, in a funny way of course. He will be hosting a stand-up comedy show on Tuesday, March 20 with Darian Lusk and Mike Amory to raise money for Relay for Life, a fundraising organization devoted to cancer research and survivor assistance. It will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. in Lecture Hall 14.
In the fall, Vaughan will teach “Gaming as Literature,” a course that looks at video games from an academic perspective, and in the following spring, he will teach a new class called “Political Humor.”
Vaughan teaches about 500 students per semester. During the first week of classes, he lines up his students and takes pictures of them which he hilariously photoshops. Using this technique, he memorizes all 500 names by the second week.
“I’m student-first,” Vaughan said. “I’m trying to give students not only an experience that they’ll learn from, but also an experience they won’t forget.”