William Earnest, better known as Billy, is a well-known St. Edward’s University communication professor. 

His conversational and critical thinking-focused teaching method has been greatly received by many of his students.

Earnest grew up in Wichita Falls, Texas.

“It’s just a big small town,” Earnest said.

Earnest began his love affair with teaching after he earned his undergraduate degree in marketing at Midwestern State University in 1989.

Shortly thereafter, Earnest was offered a teaching position at Midwestern State as a graduate student. It was at that point Earnest knew his life’s calling was to teach.

However, he also knew he wanted to give the real world a try. 

Earnest left his position at Midwestern and was recruited by Atlanta’s Electronic Data Systems, EDS. 

“I’d never been there, but I always liked the idea of living in Atlanta, so I put it down,” Earnest said. 

Earnest was happy to then be moved to Atlanta.

“For a small-town boy, it was a real-world education. I think living and working in the real world for five years has made me a much better teacher,” Earnest said.

After the five years at EDS, Earnest was ready to attain his master’s degree. He was accepted to the University of Texas to receive a master’s degree in communication.

As a masters student, Earnest also became the teaching assistant for Mark Knapp, a prominent leader in the field of communication.

Knapp quite literally wrote the book on nonverbal communication. In 1997 Knapp introduced “Lying and Deception” as a communication course at UT.

From 2002 to 2005, Earnest was hired as a full-time lecturer at UT. During this time, he also attained his doctorate in communication studies from UT.

After that, he began teaching at St. Edward’s. Over the course of his time here he has adapted “Lying and Deception” as well as “Communication and Culture” to fit into the St. Edward’s communication program.

As well as teaching, Earnest wrote the book “Save Our Slides,” a guide to PowerPoint as a form of persuasion and good presentation strategy, the idea for which began while Earnest was forced to watch terrible PowerPoint presentations at both EDS and UT.

“I wrote the book in ’07 and it is now required by the school for presentational speaking,” Earnest said.

“Save Our Slides” has been used by Indiana University, Westchester University and University of Texas.

Earnest plans to take a sabbatical next spring to work on his newest book, “The Reluctant Agnostic.”

The book will discuss the idea of the religious middle ground, analyzing those who choose to leave organized religion, but are still hopeful in faith and hesitantly become agnostics.

Through his writings and teachings, this critical thinking professor has made a real impact on the St. Edward’s community and will continue to do so for many years to come.