Teaching & Learning
As a teacher-scholar, I believe that fostering immersive learning environments that reward student research is important to the long-term success of any academic program. Science is the great equalizer. Not only does science require a removal of personal bias from a model, but also forces one to recognize and come to grips with their biases. Empiricism also provides a form of mobilization, a means to investigate issues of social injustice and analyze how best to combat them.
Additionally, these types of learned mobilization provide students with access to skillsets sought by policymakers, NGOs, INGOs, and think tanks. Therefore in conjunction with traditional teacher-scholar methods, I use problem-based learning and active-learning simulations as a means of immersing students in policy-making scenarios. Additionally, for each section I include a unifying, problem-based student learning outcome that compliments SLOs developed by academic divisions.
Perhaps my single greatest career goal is engagement in graduate education. Although many schools do not offer terminal graduate degrees, it is imperative to the continuation and evolution of our craft to be part of the process to diversify the pool of those achieving graduate education. Indeed, I believe that graduate education is two-pronged: 1) fostering gifted, undergraduate student-scholars to become graduate scholars and 2) training and molding graduate students into professional political scientists and informed policymakers. Despite these goals, most undergraduates are not going to a graduate or professional school for political science, diplomacy, or law. My pedagogical philosophy reflects this truth, by fostering student-scholarship and information literacy through effective data-driven writing assessments and classroom experiences that are important for gainful employment after college.