Communities of Mutual Uplift: Another Star Graduates from UC Davis

Dr. Andy reflects on his amazing students and interns

I write today with an expression of congratulations and farewell to an undergraduate student who has shone brightly at UC Davis, Dyson Smith.

One of the greatest benefits of teaching at UC Davis for the last 35 years is the caliber and spirit of the students I get to teach. They bring enthusiasm, discipline, and a willingness to work hard in my writing and literature classes. They learn quickly, thus inspiring me always to be learning.

I get to hire many of the best of these students who excel in my classes, or in other endeavors at UC Davis. I teach my paid interns to solve problems (sometimes my problems), to imagine big projects for themselves, and to engage with campus and Davis communities.

They have all impressed me, both while in my employ and thereafter. Students of mine have won Pulitzer Prizes, published multiple books, and earned tenure track faculty jobs. Among them: One of my former interns sold his company to Apple; another won the 2019 University Medal and is now the chief of staff to a member of the California Assembly; a third earned an MFA at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, the most prestigious of all such programs in the country.

My former interns’ and students’ purpose is not to stay in touch with me, but rather to succeed after they leave UC Davis. As Friedrich Nietzsche said, “One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil.” Sometimes LinkedIn or Facebook allow me to keep up with the progress of my former pupils. Sometimes I instead reflect on fond memories of their work in my classes, or their roles as helpers with my reading series, radio show, or book projects.

I am lucky to work with one such intern now, someone who has recently graduated from UC Davis, and whom I will miss as the producer of Dr. Andy’s Poetry and Technology Hour (which you should subscribe to wherever you get your podcasts).

Dyson Smith brims with energy, encouragement, and the sort of quiet confidence that results from his aptitude at understanding workflows, working well with others, and solving problems.

Like my wife Kate, Dyson comes from Chicago, the city that Carl Sandburg correctly named “Stormy, husky, brawling, / City of the Big Shoulders.” He brings a diligent and humble demeanor that one might expect from a Midwesterner, and the disciplined work ethic of an amateur boxer, which he is. Dyson recently graduated UC Davis majoring in Statistics, English, and Sociology. Can you imagine taking on three majors at such a demanding university?

I have worked in the College of Letters and Science for most of my career, so you can imagine how proud I was when Dyson was awarded the Herbert A. Young Award as the College of Letters and Science’s Medalist, given to the graduating senior determined to be the most outstanding.

As regulars at The Poetry Night Reading Series know, Dyson is also an accomplished poet. Earlier this year he and I performed together at the Sacramento Poetry Center. Dyson’s hungry imagination, nuanced emotions, and inventive wordplay were on display that night, as seen by many of his friends and classmates who drove across the Causeway to see him shine. He read close to the end of a recent Poetry Night open mic on the roof of the Natsoulas Gallery, bringing to the microphone the sort of humor and confidence of a veteran featured poet.

Our English department also recognized his preeminence, for last week Dyson’s honors thesis in poetry, Tomboy Ballet, won the Lois Ann Lattin prize for UC Davis’s Best Honors Creative Writing Project. Poems from that collection have been published in a number of local and distant prominent journals and anthologies, including Open Ceilings, Poet News, GTFO Poetry’s 2024 Anthology of Sacramento Poets, Euphemism andThe Madison Review.

The work to accrue so many honors and honorable accomplishments would exhaust most poets, but Dyson made room in his week for many ambitious projects. For example, in addition to his work as a poet, as a social statistician, Dyson wrote a research thesis on the association between social proximity to gun violence and chronic health conditions in California. He has also worked on other projects pertaining to housing insecurity in Davis and understanding the regrettable “deaths of despair” among formerly incarcerated persons.

Like me, Dyson is a strong proponent for public and community radio, in this case, KDVS. Our campus and community radio station remains the preeminent local source for varied sources and genres of music, all of it chosen by the volunteer DJs themselves. KDVS also provides actionable and edifying information for our community through its public affairs and news shows, and acts as a hub for people in our community who support the values and practices of KDVS.

In the past school year, my radio show producer Dyson worked as a Community-Coordinator and DJ at KDVS, bringing together new and experienced DJs to learn from each other and from the experience of hosting one’s own radio show. In addition to all that, Dyson has been a researcher at the UC Davis Innovations and Research Lab, a data analyst for Davis's Data Driven Change Club, and a submissions reader for the literary magazine Open Ceilings.

Dyson is loved by those closest to him, such as his DC-based girlfriend who did me the grand favor of introducing me to Dyson, and his mom who for many years owned a bike shop in Chicago. He is also loved and admired by his peer groups, as I have had the pleasure to see on the poetry stage and in the basement studios of KDVS.

Like the most accomplished of those remarkable students and interns who have enriched my life in the past, Dyson will also impress his future colleagues, his employers, and his future onetime UC Davis and KDVS mentor. As the poet Mark Van Doren said, “The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.” Working with Dyson has reminded me how deeply rewarding it is to support a student’s discoveries and achievements.

Dyson Smith has already discovered so much, and the horizon is wide, ready to be further discerned by his keen senses. His successes will lift him up and lift up all those admirers, such as myself, who cheer him on in his communities of mutual support.

Congratulations, Dyson!

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Best,

Dr. Andy

P.S. Three atmospheric pub quiz questions from last week:

18. When the five levels of the atmosphere are arranged alphabetically, the outermost comes first, more than 600 kilometers from earth, and where we find most satellites and the International Space Station. Name the outermost layer.

19. Born in San Francisco in 1874, one of America’s most famous poets, likely familiar to members of your team, published a poem “Atmosphere” that ends with this couplet: “Moisture and color and odor thicken here. / The hours of daylight gather atmosphere.” Name the poet.

20. Three different characters speak the following sentences in what 2019 film? “Friday, what are they firing at?” “Something just entered the upper atmosphere.” “Oh, yeah!” Name the film.

P.S. If you would like to hear some poetry by Dyson Smith, tune into KDVS (90.3 FM) today / Wednesday (June 11, 2025) at 5, or check out the podcast subsequently. I will also be joined by the France-based poet Nicolette Daskalakis.

Born in the fog of San Francisco, Nicolette Daskalakis is a writer, filmmaker, and multidisciplinary artist based in Paris. Her writing has been anthologized by HarperCollins, nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and published in numerous literary journals. Daskalakis is the author of multiple poetry books, including Tell Me I’m Not On Fire (2024) and Portrait of Your Ex Assembling Furniture (2018). She holds a BA in Film & TV Production from the USC School of Cinematic Arts and an MFA from the Institut Supérieur des Arts et du Design de Toulouse.