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Dear Dr. McCarthy,

The space you provided us this January was one of the most impactful experiences of my life. Your vulnerability, kindness, and warmth was a refreshing breath of air, and the light you infused into my consciousness has healed me in ways I was not aware possible. I felt seen and appreciated in your class, for the first time at Harvard, and I forever grateful for the knowledge and wisdom you passed to us. Thank you for sharing your joy with us. I am sending back light and joy to you, and I wish you so much rest and comfort.

Much love,

Kayla

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Sampha - (No One Knows Me) Like The Piano (Official Music Video)

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Dear Tim,

Sending you and CJ so much warmth, blessings, and love. Thank you for not just being open and vulnerable with us during our two weeks together, but through your email you continue to embody the strength it takes to share how the realities of this pandemic have affected you. Our course has impacted my HGSE experience in so many many ways. I deeply appreciate the space you and Ashley created for me to grow and interrogate the intersections of my identities. You inspired me with your authenticity, dedication to building community with such a short course, and humility with a dash of humor. I hope that you can give yourself some of the grace you have readily given us during these challenging times. The care and time you spent to create a safe yet challenging and enriching space for us is something I hope to carry with me and emulate in future spaces I try to build community with.

You brought so much joy to my HGSE experience. Thank you for laughing with us, pausing to explore the nuiances in our questions with us, and most importantly, showing up with and for us.

What I learned from you truly transformed my HGSE experience and motivation for improving higher education. Sending you strength, hope, and self-kindness. I have missed the community you helped us built deeply and I can't wait for all of us to reunite in person in Harvard Square someday soon.

With love,
Belle

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Dear Professor McCarthy,

Thank you so much for all you have done this year! From Art of Communication to Equity and Opportunity and now my Independent Study, you have been an incredible support and inspiration. You made my experience at Harvard so incredible, and I hope you know how much I appreciate your time and energy every time we get to chat. You really lead by example and I appreciate your honesty, humility, and always walking the walk. You are someone I will never forget, and I can't wait to get those drinks with you when this is all over.

Thank you for everything,
Carrah

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Dear Professor McCarthy,

Thank you for creating and cultivating a space for growth and healing for our community. When I see our group chat, or I am in a different class and someone chats me "engaged pedagogy!" or any number of other connections, I reflect on how this community began less than two months ago and how we are becoming.

Thank you for encouraging and inspiring me to grow in my racial and intersectional identities. I appreciate your vulnerability, courage, grace, and hope. I am sending you love, light, and aloha now and always.

Hawai'i '78, which you may have heard in my extended reflection is an anthem to Hawaiian sovereignty that reflects history and struggle. This version, reflects the history and struggle, and also the hope of collective voices. This version includes artists across the islands and highlights students from some of Hawaii's charter schools based on culture, community & kaina (kai/ocean + ʻāina). In this song, I hope that you see, hear, and feel the light, love, aloha, resistance, and hope in our history and history to come.

Honored and humbled,
Kari

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"Hawaiʻi ʻ78" | Song Across Hawaiʻi | Playing for Change Collaboration

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Dear Mr. Tim,

When I got your email, I lit a candle, placed it by my computer, and took a long deep breath. I am so grateful for your openness, warmth, humor, and vulnerability that you so graciously shared with us, in both this community, and also in our Arts of Communication community. You have somehow managed to create 2 of the most loving, exciting, and enlightening zoom classroom spaces I have ever had the honor of being a part of, and for that I want to say- Thank you. Thank you for showing us how to be brave and strong in our vulnerability and honesty. Thank you for modeling grace, for showing us your human heart, and for laughing with us with your joyous wonderful laugh. Thank you for teaching me how to tell a GOOD story in 4 minutes! And for all of your advice and feedback. Thank you for exposing me to the writings of so many scholars and change makers. Thank you for showing up for us in this time of total chaos, fear, uncertainty. Thank you for coming back to Harvard. It was the greatest gift I could have be given this year.

I've learned so much from you.

With love, hope and admiration,
Rebecca

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Professor McCarthy,
The impact one has on the life of others often goes beyond what is seen or measured.  This idea is certainly true with you.  You created a consistent light for our class for two weeks which spread into a persistent light in my life.  We have all been held in the warmth and support that you provided for us in class, and we hope to be able to return some of that feeling to you during this time of emergence from the darkness. Know that you are inspirational, you challenge and cultivate deep thought, you radiate love and generosity. Each of your attributes fill the cups of others and foster similar ideals in those whose lives you touch. During challenging times, I often think about how to keep moving--often because stopping is just as overwhelming as continuing to move onward.  Langston Hughes provides insight to me in Mother to Son, as life is not a crystal stair. Now, in particular, it feels as if it is a cobbled together and rather broken stair.  Yet, just as with the son and his mother, moving forward can be so much easier when done with others.  You have provided a well of potential and hope in us during our time together.  Sending hope that your well will be refilled with love, persistence, and possibility.

With love and admiration,
Kathryn

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For there is always light, if only we're brave enough to see it. If only we're brave enough to be it.

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For there is always light, if only we're brave enough to see it. If only we're brave enough to be it.

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Dear Dr. McCarthy,

I write to send you strength and gratitude. The deep and abiding community you built through our course in just 2 weeks is surely a testament to the energy you bring to your work in all contexts. I'm quite sure, therefore, that you have many people who love and care about you.

My hope is that you feel our gratitude and love from afar as you navigate this difficult time, because it surely is being sent.

I'm grateful to you for the love and passion you conveyed, evident even through a screen, during our community's two weeks together. Thanks for being our light (a sentiment shared by many).

I'm mindful of this passage from Amanda Gorman's magnificent Inaugural Poem:

When day comes we ask ourselves,
where can we find light in this never-ending shade?
The loss we carry,
a sea we must wade.
We've braved the belly of the beast,
We've learned that quiet isn't always peace,
and the norms and notions
of what just is
isn't always just-ice.
And yet the dawn is ours
before we knew it.

Warmly,

Ryan

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Dr. McCarthy,

Thank you! Thank you for the first "How are you?" that allowed you to see a true glimpse of the student that would excitingly enroll in your class.

Thank you for exemplifying what it means to honor the teachers/educators/professor of your past to be a legend in MY academic trajectory. "Engaged Pedagogy" at its finest.

Thank you.

I'm trying to find some elaborate and wordy way of saying "Thank you!" You saw me and I wanna make sure you know that I still have a candle by my computer when I need to "light my fire" because YOU are SEEN. LOVED. AFFIRMED.

Ubuntu,

-tc.

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Mother to Son
BY LANGSTON HUGHES
Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps
’Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.

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Sam Cooke - A Change Is Gonna Come (Official Lyric Video)

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“Hope” is the thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard

And sore must be the storm -

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -

And on the strangest Sea -

Yet - never - in Extremity,

It asked a crumb - of me.

(Emily Dickinson)

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The Beatles - The Beatles - Here Comes The Sun (Official Music Video) [2019 Mix]

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Dear Professor McCarthy,

Thank you for making our two weeks together transformative! Keep making a difference in this world!

- Hector

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Katrina & The Waves - Walking On Sunshine (Official Music Video)

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Dear Tim,

In my last class at HGSE, I am so grateful to have had you as a professor. You embody what it means to be a great teacher, and also a great human. You are thoughtful, supportive, and gracious; you look at us holistically and support our individual and collective journeys. During a time when classes are hard and life is hard, J-term was a powerful community  where I felt able to engage and to grow as a student, educator, and person. I think of the ripple effect of the lives you have touched as a teacher and then the lives those educators have gone on to touch. I hope that during this time, you feel the collective love and hugs from all of these lives coming back to you.

With love,

Margot

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Dear Professor McCarthy,

Life right now (and to be honest even when we're not in a pandemic) can be hard and dark and painful. We struggle and stumble, lose friends, make mistakes, fight with the ones we love most, disappoint ourselves, forget what we are fighting for and ask ourselves what the point of all this even is. It becomes so much easier at times to crawl in bed and let sleep take us away, even for a couple of hours. but there is this one quote, from a movie which has bewitched so many hearts all over the world: " “Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.” And it is so cliche and I truly don't believe that happiness can actually be found, but there is something in this idea of turning on a light, of opening the curtains yourself or letting someone give you some of their light. It doesn't blow away the darkness completely but it reminds us that we are not alone in this, that when we can't find it ourselves, people around us can help us find some light again. So this is us, and me, giving you some of the light you've given us during our classes together.
You're a wonderful human being and we are all so grateful to have had you as our teacher and mentor, even for a little while. Thank you for having walked with us!

This is becoming really long but I am sharing some songs on this board as well  which always make me incredibly happy when I hear them, even in the darkest times, I hope they cheer you up as well!

Love,
Blansefloer

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Dear Tim,

You have all my love and support. It has brought me nothing but joy to be a student of yours. I am honored!

Hugs,
Meghan

P.S. Did I ever tell you I visited the Stonewall Inn during the NYC World Pride event? I was in NYC just for a day for a visa appointment, but I made a special point to visit Stonewall. I know I would not have known that piece of queer history, let alone have visited the site on a hot summer day after rising very early that morning, if it were not for you, your teaching, your compassion, your fire, your love, your support. Thank you for making me feel seen and heard. I always feel like I belong when I am in conversation and community with you - and as someone who felt/feels out of place, that means a lot. I'm going to drop in here a song that an adoptee friend recently recommended to me, called "Who You Are." It felt like the universe sent it my way (in particular the "it's okay not to be okay...just be true to who you are"), and my hope is that it resonates in some way. Much love to you and who you are.