Teaching
I have passion and experience in effective teaching practices for geoscience education in the classroom and field. At UChicago, I am currently teaching and developing a variety of geoscience courses, from introductory courses for non-major undergrads to graduate courses for students in our master’s degree program.
My background as a student in a range of educational environments at Nebraska and Caltech motivated me to learn more about pedagogy, so I started exploring discipline-based education research, participated in workshops at my universities’ teaching centers, and took a term-long course on principles of university teaching and learning in STEM that focused on evidence-based equitable education practices.
Teaching Experience
I currently work as an Assistant Instructional Professor at UChicago, where I am teaching introductory courses on a range of geoscience topics for non-major undergraduates, as well as developing graduate-level courses for our upcoming Environmental Science MS Program.
I served as research faculty for the Juneau Icefield Research Program field school in 2017 and 2019 while performing field work in partnership with the program. In this role, I have given interactive lectures to the JIRP cohorts of undergraduate and graduate students on the use of seismology and other geophysical techniques in glacier research and involved JIRP students in my field work.
I also served as a teaching assistant for courses at Caltech on introductory geophysics, introductory geology & geochemistry, field geophysics, and plate tectonics.
Course Offerings
I am qualified and excited to lead effective courses in a variety of geoscience topics for a variety of student levels.
Examples include:
Introductory level undergraduate courses: geology, geophysics, cryosphere, natural hazards
Upper level undergraduate or graduate courses: seismology, glaciology, geophysical field methods, geophysical data methods
Intro-level interdisciplinary courses: natural hazards at the movies, geology in art through time, or other creative collaborations between faculty!
Students
Annika Richardson
Annika is an undergraduate student at UCalgary working with me on using low-cost Raspberry Shake seismometers for glacier monitoring. She earned funding through the Northern Scientific Training Program to use Raspberry Shakes at Salmon Glacier, British Columbia as part of our larger geophysical deployment, and we’re excited to see what the data show!
Holly Basiuk
Holly is a Masters student at UCalgary working with me on change over time at Salmon Glacier, British Columbia. We’re integrating historic data with new geophysical observations to understand how glacier changes affect glacial lake outburst floods. Holly is a pro at making digital elevation models!
