Teaching
Teaching Areas
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Statistics for social scientists
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Research methods
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Social stratification
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Sociology of education
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Social psychology
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Introduction to sociology
Teaching Experience
Through a variety of teaching settings, I have gained experience in large, time-intensive classes catering to diverse groups of students, and high-level coursework with smaller groups of students. First, I have taught as a certified high school teacher and implemented a classroom-based guidance curriculum for hundreds of students at a time as a licensed high school counselor. Second, while working at Grand Valley State University’s College of Education, I served as an instructor of middle and high school teachers and pre-teachers. In those courses I taught and modeled the fundamentals of designing service-learning lesson plans for K-12 students. Finally, at UW-Madison I have supervised and mentored undergraduate student researchers through the Department of Sociology’s Concentration in Analysis and Research (CAR) internship program. In this role, I provided students with guidance and hands-on experience working with district administrative data and applying basic statistical techniques to produce findings from those data.
Teaching Philosophy
My teaching follows two related approaches: critical thinking and problem-solving approaches for large-group undergraduate courses and additional experiential and service components for upper-level undergraduate and graduate coursework. As a faculty member, I will use these approaches to help students develop into critical and involved citizens and detail-oriented, free-thinking professionals or scholars.