As a teacher, my most fundamental goal is to equip students with the tools to navigate an increasingly global society. Second, I promote student development of critical thinking, reading, and writing as mutually reinforcing and lifelong skills. Third, I approach writing expansively. Finally, I encourage students to apply their learning and make connections beyond the classroom.
Toward these goals, I scaffold readings, classroom activities, and assignments. For example, students in my Introductory Sociology course at UCLA began by examining their positions in the social world. We started a lesson on class reproduction with an article on Black Philly by a UCLA faculty. I then asked students to connect the academic and the personal by reporting on their hometown's demographic makeup across several decades of the U.S. Census. Next, students wrote essays comparing their neighborhoods to the studies of urban change we read, often noting how their Census racial classifications shifted over time. Later, they expanded their analyses with cross-country comparisons. Students came to appreciate revising as an integral part of writing and as a medium for developing their ideas.
Students carried these lessons with them beyond the classroom to connect with faculty whose research appeared in the syllabus. I have supported students through their graduate school applications and honors theses, and continue to do at NYU Abu Dhabi through convening Senior Capstone. I have emphasized local engagements and global forces in my research and teaching in Los Angeles, Berlin, and Abu Dhabi. In each instance, I emphasize the learning objectives that I hope students will carry with them into future careers in public policy, law, non-profit work, and research.
Toward these goals, I scaffold readings, classroom activities, and assignments. For example, students in my Introductory Sociology course at UCLA began by examining their positions in the social world. We started a lesson on class reproduction with an article on Black Philly by a UCLA faculty. I then asked students to connect the academic and the personal by reporting on their hometown's demographic makeup across several decades of the U.S. Census. Next, students wrote essays comparing their neighborhoods to the studies of urban change we read, often noting how their Census racial classifications shifted over time. Later, they expanded their analyses with cross-country comparisons. Students came to appreciate revising as an integral part of writing and as a medium for developing their ideas.
Students carried these lessons with them beyond the classroom to connect with faculty whose research appeared in the syllabus. I have supported students through their graduate school applications and honors theses, and continue to do at NYU Abu Dhabi through convening Senior Capstone. I have emphasized local engagements and global forces in my research and teaching in Los Angeles, Berlin, and Abu Dhabi. In each instance, I emphasize the learning objectives that I hope students will carry with them into future careers in public policy, law, non-profit work, and research.