Teaching

I believe teaching can have a significant impact on the future of our society, especially in environmental fields. I personally entered the environmental sciences because of an incredible high school biology teacher who used storytelling and interactive experiences to make learning fun. Because of this experience, I am dedicated to using inclusive, student-based learning strategies which make learning more enjoyable while allowing a larger section of students to better learn and retain information. I also genuinely care about my students. I try to get to know them as people and learn about their goals. While lecturing and fact-based teaching are essential for developing basic knowledge and skills in an area, as a teacher I believe it is my job to use these approaches as a jumping off point to more applied and interactive teaching methods that can help facilitate better learning outcomes. I am not an individual who spends my entire class period lecturing as I myself do not learn well in those types of environments. Instead, I believe strongly in interactive and cooperative learning strategies. My teaching style also includes a strong applied component that seeks to show students how the content fits into the big picture. I am also comfortable with teaching online and using technology as I was able to help develop one of the first iterations of online biology for non-majors at the University of Florida when I served as a teaching assistant for that course.

Teaching Experience

Biology of Salamanders Co-instructor. University of Florida. Spring 2016.

Biology II Lab teaching assistant. University of Florida. Fall 2012. Spring 2013.

Web-based Biology for Non-majors teaching assistant. University of Florida. Fall 2011. Spring 2012.

Biology II undergraduate teaching assistant. The Ohio State University. 2003.