MARC MAY: I'm Marc May, assistant professor of electronic media and film, here at Towson University, and I'm the College of Fine Arts and Communications Theme Scholar for this school year. And our theme has been "What's Your Story?" And if you've been listening, you've been listening to our wonderful "What's Your Story?" podcast, where we've interviewed administration, faculty, staff, and found out what their stories are. And. With me today, I have Adam Schwartz, who's a lecturer in my department, electronic media and film. Adam records our "What's Your Story?" podcasts. He's the man who runs the board, directs everything, tells us what to do. And we thought, what a great way to finish to bring Adam out and ask him what his story was. So Adam, thank you for joining us. ADAM SCHWARTZ: Pleasure. Thank you. MARC MAY: So Adam, not to put too fine a point on it, what is your story? ADAM SCHWARTZ: My story starts in England. Everybody's always very surprised, but I actually was born and raised in England. MARC MAY: Now why are they surprised? Because you do not have any English accent whatsoever? ADAM SCHWARTZ: That is exactly why they are surprised. My parents are from the Bronx, and they always thought that they were going to move back to the states. So I went to an international school. Long story short, no accent. And then I came over to the states to go to college, American University. Was an audio technology major, and then wound up working in post-production doing sound design and production sound for TV and film for almost 15 years. And now, I'm very happy to be at Towson. MARC MAY: So when you're doing this recording today, who's running the board, Adam? Who's recording? How are we doing this? Because you're normally behind a big glass window. What's going on? ADAM SCHWARTZ: My engineering side of my body is currently behind a big glass window. I did just push record, but I'm also on this side, which is a little more challenging for me. MARC MAY: Very good. How many "What's Your Story?" podcasts have we recorded this semester? ADAM SCHWARTZ: This is the 17th. MARC MAY: 17, well, that's actually a fair amount of content. And you're used to generating a lot of content, aren't you? ADAM SCHWARTZ: I am. Yourself, Marc May, and Dr. Michael Duffy, here at EMS, we produce weekly film reviews that are aired on WTMD called "Silver Screen Radio." so we're doing a lot of recording down here at EMF. MARC MAY: So tell us about the podcast this year. Which "What's Your Story?" was your favorite? ADAM SCHWARTZ: Wow, that is very tough, because there were a lot of great stories. I think Dr. Chandler's. MARC MAY: You're not just saying that because he's the Provost, right? ADAM SCHWARTZ: I'm not. I'm saying that because it was a emotional, intense, and fascinating story, and also because he told a completely different story when we first hit record. And then, as I was kind of wrapping up and we were chit-chatting, he started telling me the story that wound up in the podcast. And I kind of said, whoa. Stop everything. I need to plug this microphone back in. MARC MAY: So obviously, everybody is very different. This is almost my Barbara Walters question. Nonetheless, if we're all different, did you notice anything the same about all of these talented people? ADAM SCHWARTZ: One thing that made recording these podcasts a lot easier than I had initially thought was that all these people, in their work, whether it's dance or theater or music or film production or any of the mass communications fields of studies, were all storytellers. So when I put a microphone in front of them, they absolutely knew what to do. MARC MAY: You've heard 17 and recorded 17 "What's Your Story? podcasts. What's the takeaway for you from hearing all of them? ADAM SCHWARTZ: Hearing all of the podcasts, recording them, editing them, so listening to them over and over and over again, my big takeaway was just how diverse and exceptional our guests that we interviewed were. Every single one of them, I learned a lot. And I learned about their struggles, and their struggles are all very relatable and all-encompassing, because we all go through serious struggles and all the best stories, right, are about overcoming adversity. And all of these wonderful faculty and staff members that we interviewed have all absolutely done that, professionally, personally, in a lot of different ways. And it was reassuring and comforting to hear that from all these people. That's what's so great about stories, right? You don't feel like you're the only one going through this. MARC MAY: All right. Well, Adam, thank you so much. It's been wonderful to just have a moment to actually get to talk to you. ADAM SCHWARTZ: Marc, on behalf of COFAC, thank you very much for being our theme scholar for the year. You wrote a couple of great essays, one of which is available all over the place, it seems, in the "What's Your Story?" pamphlets that are all over in ECOFAC building and hopefully, other buildings as well. And then the online spring essay that you wrote, which they're both great reads. MARC MAY: Well, thank you thank you very much. We're looking forward to next year's theme, which is "Drones and Droids." Adam, thank you so much for joining us today and for running the lead on our "What's Your Story?" podcast. It takes a village to put these together, that's absolutely true. I also want to give a special shout-out to the chair of electronic media and film, Michael Angelella. It was his wonderful idea that brought all of this to you in the very first place. So we would say thank you. And thanks to all our fantastic COFAC faculty, staff, and our wonderful administration for all the support you've given. And thank you to everyone for participating. ADAM SCHWARTZ: And I do want to give one more special thank you to a former student, because he graduated, but last semester, I got a lot of help with these podcasts from Robert Cade, a stellar EMF student. Thanks, Robert. MARC MAY: Listen to our "What's Your Story?" podcast if you haven't. They're terrific. And next year, our theme is "Drones and Droids," so be on the lookout. [MUSIC PLAYING]