Teaching Portfolio

Statement of Teaching Philosophy

My interest in teaching began as an undergraduate at the University of Utah. I was asked to be a teaching assistant for Introduction to Engineering Computing, a Chemical Engineering course that gave students a background in programming, and Numerical Methods, a higher-level course on algorithms and numerical analysis. My experience teaching as an undergraduate tremendously influenced my decision to pursue graduate school. As a Ph.D. candidate at Johns Hopkins University, my interest in science education and pedagogy evolved into a passion.  

At Johns Hopkins, I was a teaching assistant under Dr. Jeff Gray for the course Introduction to Chemical and Biological Process Analysis. In place of traditional TA recitations, we adopted the workshop-style, active-learning principles of Peer-Led Team Learning. Committed to creating an environment that included every student, I led students through engineering problems using innovative game-like strategies to foster teamwork and engaged learning. This experience significantly informed my teaching philosophy, as I observed how an environment of respect and encouragement fostered the development of communication skills, allowed students to integrate concepts, and ultimately led to better learning outcomes. At the end of this course, my students nominated me for the Graduate Teaching Assistant Award for the Whiting School of Engineering.

I continued to pursue teaching opportunities throughout my career in graduate school. I guest-lectured and developed course material for Applications of Molecular Evolution to Biotechnology and Introduction to Biological Molecules. From 2013-2016, I was involved in the JHU Teaching Academy certificate program, which includes workshops, courses, mentored teaching opportunities, and a capstone. In Spring 2017, I was the instructor of record for MATLAB Made Easy, an introductory programming class for engineering students. In this capacity, I had the opportunity to organize a course, utilize course management software, and write a full series of lectures, activities, homework assignments, and exams.

Whether giving a lecture or leading an informal workshop, creating a classroom environment that is welcoming and engaging is one of my top priorities. As a woman in engineering, I have some experience being the minority in a classroom. As a teacher, my goal is to make every student feel respected and essential to the classroom dynamic. I design learning objectives with Bloom’s Taxonomy in mind, looking for ways to help students progress from knowledge to synthesis and evaluation of concepts on a higher level. Ultimately, my goal as an educator is to not only help students develop practical skills for STEM careers, but also inspire them toward deep thinking and life-long education.

Statement of Teaching Responsibilities

EN.540.111.04 MATLAB Made Easy, Instructor of Record

Course Description: This course uses MATLAB to teach the fundamentals of programming, exploring such questions as: What is a program? How can we use loops and branches to accomplish a task? What exactly is MATLAB doing when it’s running a script? It builds upon the fundamentals of programming to tackle relevant engineering problems. This course is designed to help ChemBE students excel in subsequent engineering courses, such as Modeling and Statistics, Separations, and Chemical Kinetics.

Responsibilities: As the instructor of record for a section of 25 freshman and sophomore engineering students, I had the freedom to develop all aspects of the course based on some existing materials from the previous year. I developed learning objectives, created weekly lectures and active-learning exercises, and wrote homework, exam, and final project materials. I created grading rubrics and graded all homework assignments and exams. I utilized Blackboard to distribute materials and track grades. To supplement my lectures each week, I held office hours and homework help sessions.

AS.020.205 Introduction to Biological Molecules, Guest Lecturer

Course Description: This course presents an overview to biochemistry and molecular biology, especially focusing on biotechnology and medicine.

Responsibilities: I wrote and delivered four guest lectures for this course as my capstone for the JHU Teaching Academy certificate. I designed lectures from scratch, implementing a combination of blackboard-and-chalk-style lecturing, active-learning activities, in-class technology for mini-quizzes, and supporting media. I also wrote homework and exam problems drawing on Bloom’s Taxonomy to complement my lectures.       

EN.540.202  Introduction to Chemical and Biological Process Analysis, Teaching Assistant  

Course Description: This course provides an introduction to chemical and biomolecular engineering and the fundamental principles of chemical process analysis. It covers formulation and solution of material and energy balances on chemical processes, reductionist approaches to the solution of complex, multi-unit processes, and introduction to the basic concepts of thermodynamics and chemical/biochemical reactions.

Responsibilities: As the teaching assistant for this course, I was given tremendous freedom and responsibility to design my weekly TA sessions. I held two 2-hour workshop-style sessions each week wherein I reviewed lecture material, selected example problems to work, designed game-like strategies to facilitate balanced group involvement, and guided students toward solutions. I was also responsible for grading homework, writing solution guides, holding exam review sessions and weekly office hours, and helping to grade exams.