Academics | Teaching statement

I believe being a good teacher not only requires mastering the subject of matter, but also striving to engage, challenge, and inspire change in students' minds. It is my belief that, “student” is the center for the “teaching” environment, and “change” is the key for their success. Once realizing the importance of the “change”, I believe that every student is capable of tasting the passion that I feel for science and understanding the world around us with a scientific thinking...

I believe in bringing three overarching objectives to the classroom.

First, presenting the information to the students and engaging them in the knowledge, inviting them for the change.

Second is challenging students to interconnect their knowledge (for example, a case study requiring them to use their knowledge on daily examples – where they would need to search, and apply their knowledge to real life situations).

The final step, which actually is a more standardized version of the second objective is the exams. I prefer to use exams, essay topics, and research projects that are generally open ended with no single correct answer. I am more interested in developing a student’s capacity to learn how to use their information cogently, persuasively, and synthetically, rather than finding the "correct answer". A vivid example to this would be one of the questions that I still remember from the microbiology course I have taken during my undergraduate education. At the final exam of our microbiology class, one of the questions was “Cell is like a factory, explain”. Although, I may word this question in a little different way, but I truly believe that this little question asks students to use many of the connections that they have learned during the semester and synthesize them in a direction that they would explain several analogies of cell’s functions to a factory’s, and I believe, this question would help students much more than 15-20 questions which asks for direct information about functions of cellular organelles.

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