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Award-winning storyteller, Jay O’Callahan, performed his original stories on Wednesday evening in King Theatre. Mr. O’Callahan, this fall’s Bingham Visiting Writer, has been dubbed “a genius” by Time Magazine and trumpeted as “a theater troupe inside one body” by the Associated Press.

Mr. O’Callahan has written and performed solo pieces at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, the National Theatre Complex in London, the Olympics, the Lincoln Center, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. His work has received awards from the National Endowment of the Arts, the National Education Film Festival, the Fund for U.S. Artists at International Festivals, Parents’ Choice, the New England Theater Conference and UNESCO. He is a regular contributor to National Public Radio. Most recently, NASA commissioned him to write and perform a story in honor of their fiftieth anniversary; he is currently performing Forged in the Stars at NASA locations around the country.

Dr. Donald Johnson—English professor and poet in residence at East Tennessee State University—was this fall’s Bingham Visiting Reader. Dr. Johnson met with students in Class I and II, and in honor of Veterans’ Day, he began his reading with two poems that are about soldiers and war. The first, “The Sergeant,” was inspired by his father, a World War II veteran who later commanded a squad of the Honor Guard that traveled to West Virginia. The second poem he read, titled “Point Lookout, Maryland” recalled the American Civil War, and Dr. Johnson explained: “In East Tennessee, memories of our Civil War are still quite alive, quite vivid in some families. Our state was divided in the Civil War—many families were divided.”

Described by his peers as the “dean of sport literature” and “a master craftsman,” Dr. Johnson draws inspiration these days from the natural world, and from taking close notice of the details of life. He read several poems from his most recent book of poetry,More Than Heavy Rain—poems that bring to light his home on the Watauga River, his family, and observations of life lived outside.

Neekon Vafa (I) and Harry Kwon (I) took their computer programming skills to a whole new level when they participated in—and placed first at—MIT’s Internet of Things Hackathon earlier this month. A hackathon is an event in which computer programmers and software developers collaborate intensively on software projects.

“The spirit of a hackathon isn’t competitive,” says Harry. “Everyone goes there to learn, even the most experienced programmers.”

Most of the attendees are working professionals; Neekon and Harry were the only high school students participating. Over the summer, Neekon added his name to MIT’s waitlist after researching various hackathons. The night before the two-day event, Neekon received word that he was in, with a couple of extra tickets included.

This week, activist and author Debby Irving talked with students about what she explained as an epidemic of “white silence.” This fall’s Multiculturalism and Community Development speaker, Ms. Irving said that when it comes to racism in the United States, white people must be part of “cross-racial conversations” in order to make progress on racial divisions and injustices.