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At the University of Tennessee (UT), advertising and public relations professor Matthew Pittman—hailed by the New York Post as “everyone’s favorite teacher”—made headlines by ending class early. Why did he do it? Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce got engaged. A viral video captured the moment—a student sprinting for the door, classmates scrambling to grab their bags, the room buzzing with barely contained excitement. Pittman later revealed it was a staged “teaching moment,” predicting that the engagement announcement would likely become the “number one shared post in the history of social media.”
@utk.socialmedia Our professor cancelled class because of the engagement! @Taylor Swift @New Heights #taylorswift #traviskelce #engagement #royalwedding #newheights ♬ original sound – UTKSM
This may be the only concrete example we have of a class being disrupted for Swifty news, but the fact that Pittman is being celebrated as a campus icon underscores how culturally resonant the stunt was. He’s not just a professor who canceled class—he’s a legend in the eyes of a generation that treats Swift like a secular deity. And for anyone wondering why students might lose their minds over a pop star’s engagement, this moment offers a clue.
Before diving in, I should expose my bias. I’ve never been a Swifty. My only soft spot is the viral YouTube edit of “Trouble,” where the soaring “oh” in the chorus cuts to a screaming goat. Beyond that, Swift’s appeal has eluded me. Her climate change lectures, for example—lectures that some students may take at face value—ring hollow as she crisscrosses the country in private jets. One infamous eight-minute hop from Cahokia, Illinois, to St. Louis comes to mind. Reports say she wasn’t on that flight, but I find that doubtful—likely, it was her legal team, known for aggressively suing anyone who portrays her negatively, behind the reports claiming she wasn’t on the plane to protect her image. (Note: the University of Pennsylvania called Swift the “climate hero we need.”)
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And Swift’s origin story only deepens my skepticism. The small-town country girl narrative is a myth. Her parents, a former marketing executive and a Merrill Lynch adviser—both very wealthy people—orchestrated her rise with financial savvy. They relocated the family to Tennessee, positioning her within Nashville’s orbit, with her mother chauffeuring her to drop demo CDs at record labels while her father supported the move financially. Her rise was not organic; it was a well-funded family project. And considering she isn’t even the best vocalist in the industry, her success owes more to money and marketing than to talent.
Nevertheless, despite my personal skepticism, Swift is undeniably a cultural icon—and colleges and universities have noticed.
In 2022, New York University (NYU) awarded her an honorary doctorate. Initially, one critic argued that this was a slap in the face to students who endured grueling coursework, research marathons, low pay, and crushing debt. Yet, reflecting further, the same critic shifted her opinion after noting that Swift “had never had the opportunity to don a cap and gown before her moment at NYU.” For the thousands of NYU graduates at Yankee Stadium that day, Swift’s presence symbolized something larger. Her music, the soundtrack of their adolescence, represented a different kind of education—one of emotional resonance and cultural affect. Influence and achievement, the critic said, don’t always follow a rigid academic path. “[W]e should understand that bestowing an honorary degree was a simple, inspiring (and harmless) way to recognize Swift’s talent and impact on a generation soon to carve out their own path in the world.” I see merit in both perspectives.
But what do Pittman’s stunt and the students’ gushing really say about higher education?
As one Catholic friend put it, Pittman’s stunt—and the likelihood that students across the country seized the engagement announcement as an excuse to skip class—felt like a secular attempt to stage a “kairotic moment:” a fleeting instance of transcendence once reserved for sacred events. Colleges and universities used to align their calendars with the liturgical year, giving students time to observe Holy Week. Now, classes run on Holy Thursday and Good Friday, yet a pop star’s engagement can grind the academic machine to a halt.
Patrick Brown, writing for Compact, adds another layer, really hitting the nail on the head. He argues that Swift’s journey from country “ingénue” to pop colossus, now capped with a happily ever after alongside Travis Kelce, offers hope in an age of loneliness and fractured families. Going even deeper, he notes that Swift’s story reinforces a cultural script that marriage is a capstone, not a cornerstone—a reward for career success rather than a vocation pursued early. For college students, especially young women, this narrative shapes aspirations, often at the expense of deeper intellectual or personal growth. (This focus on social scripts and relational signaling echoes issues I explored in my earlier essay on the “Blue Bubble Elite,” where young men’s digital status markers—like iPhones—play an outsized role in dating and social validation, illustrating how campus culture amplifies loneliness and prioritizes image over substance.)
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To be sure, however, the excitement over Swift is less a generational flaw—and perhaps even less a symptom of some problem with higher education—and more simply a symptom of what Americans have always done: we gush over celebrities.
On October 3, 1955, Elvis Presley performed at Texas A&M’s G. Rollie White Coliseum. Dressed in a pink dinner jacket and red shoes, he sent the female audience into a frenzy, with some tossing undergarments onstage. (Today, you can even bid on a pair of ladies’ underwear thrown at Elvis.) Even the Corps of Cadets ended up dancing to “Shake, Rattle and Roll.” And nearly a decade later, in February 1964, The Beatles landed in the U.S., greeted by thousands of fans—many of whom skipped school—who jammed the JFK airport decks and overwhelmed the police. The Ed Sullivan Show received 50,000 ticket requests for just 728 seats.
These moments weren’t just concerts; they were cultural ruptures, pulling young people away from their routines, including education. The difference today is scale—social media amplifies these congregations, turning a pop star’s engagement into a global event. So, I wouldn’t claim that this single incident—the UT professor ending class—is proof that higher education has abandoned virtuous values (there are plenty of other examples for that). But this moment does offer an opportunity for reflection.
Suppose students were more deeply trained in critical thinking. In such case, they might recognize Swift’s carefully curated persona for what it is—a meticulously managed facade—and, instead, see past the contradictions in her image and hollow environmental lectures. At the same time, as Brown observes, cultural scripts that treat marriage as an endgame can shape how students interpret such milestones. Freed from this framing, students might view Swift and Kelce’s engagement as a late-blooming personal milestone rather than a model for their own lives—and instead focus on cultivating their own meaningful relationships rather than investing existential significance in a pop star’s life.
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Image: “Taylor Swift” by Eva Rinaldi on Wikimedia Commons
