Teaching Experience

I have 10 semesters of experience teaching undergraduate biology labs, first as an undergraduate Teaching Assistant, then as a laboratory coordinator, and currently as a graduate Teaching Assistant. These experiences are described below.

You can read about my teaching philosophy here.

Cornell University

In 2021, I was a recipient of the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant award from the Cornell University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

BIOMG 2801, Undergraduate Lab in Genetics and Genomics (2018, 2019, 2020)

BIOMG 2801, a stand-alone lab course, is a required course for the undergraduate biology major. The student population is primarily juniors and seniors. As a TA, my responsibilities included:

  • teaching lab sections of 18-20 students
  • grading assignments, lab reports, and exams
  • supervising undergraduate Teaching Assistants
  • holding weekly office hours

In the four semesters that I have been a TA for this course, I have taken on additional leadership roles, involving:

  • participating in proofreading new assignment and exam questions during a large curricular overhaul
  • piloting an all-virtual summer session in preparation for the Fall 2020 semester
  • co-leading weekly TA meetings, and
  • developing grading rubrics for student work

Scholarship of Teaching and Learning program (2019-2020)

BIOMG 2801 is one of very few required courses for the undergraduate biology major. Curious about why this is the case, I designed and implemented a research project as part of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning program. My project, advised by Dr. Kimberly Williams, drew on newspaper articles and task force reports to reconstruct the history of the undergraduate biology major requirements at Cornell. I also interviewed a current student and a faculty member about how they conceived of the major.

I found that although the current major requirements ostensibly implemented the curricular redesign proposed in 2008, there is a discrepancy between how this curriculum was envisioned and how it is understood by students and faculty alike. I presented this work at the Mini-Symposium on Connecting Research and Teaching in May 2020.

Georgetown University

Laboratory Coordinator (2014-2016)

As the laboratory coordinator for the Discovery Center in the Department of Human Science, I supported laboratory instruction for the anatomy and physiology, genetics, microbiology, and cell biology courses. This entailed:

  • preparing teaching materials (both documents and technical preparations)
  • supervising undergraduate and medical student Teaching Assistants
  • serving as instructional support for 5-7 three-hour labs per week
When not supporting classroom teaching, I was also responsible for the shared research lab of six faculty members, including ordering and budgeting, ensuring EH&S compliance, lab upkeep, and monitoring the ~20 undergraduate research students using the space.

Swarthmore College

Teaching Assistant (2013-2014)

As an undergraduate, I was a Teaching Assistant for the laboratory components of the two introductory biology courses: Cellular and Molecular Biology (BIOL 001) and Organismal and Population Biology (BIOL 002). This involved hands-on assistance during the lab period, as well as running extra statistical help sessions.

Writing Associate (2011-2014)

I was recruited to participate in the Writing Associate (WA) Fellowship program, and trained in a semester-long course in writing pedagogy. For 3 years, I worked as a "Course WA" for the introductory biology courses, assigned 10-12 students each semester. Throughout the semester, I worked one-on-one with these students to mentor them through the process of writing lab reports.

In my 3 years as a WA, I also worked in the Swarthmore College Writing Center, where I helped students at all levels on discipline-specific writing practices across all disciplines, and served as a peer mentor to a total of five WAs-in-training.