University of Kansas Courses Taught:

  • 2025 Fall: ASTR 391, calculus-based undergraduate. 7 students, description below.
  • 2025 Spring: ASTR/PHSX 794, graduate-level course on interiors & atmospheres of stars & planets.
  • 2024 Fall: ASTR 691, upper-division undergraduate. ~20 students; description below.
  • 2024 Fall: HNRS 190, freshman-level Honors seminar.
  • 2023 Spring: ASTR 391, calculus-based undergraduate. ~22 students, description below.
  • 2022 Fall: ASTR 691, upper-division undergraduate. ~20 students; description below.
  • 2022 Spring: ASTR 391, calculus-based undergraduate. ~22 students, description below.
  • 2021 Fall: ASTR 792, graduate-level course on Extrasolar Planets. Course of ~8 graduate students and senior undergrads.
  • 2021 Spring: ASTR 391, calculus-based undergraduate. ~19 students, description below.
  • 2020 Fall: ASTR 691, upper-division undergraduate introduction to radiation processes, thermal processes, and radiative transfer in stellar atmospheres and the interstellar medium. Course of 25, mostly physics and astronomy majors.
  • 2020 Spring: ASTR 391, calculus-based undergraduate introduction to astronomy and astrophysics. Course of 19, majors and nonmajors from freshmen to seniors.

MIT University Courses Taught:

  • 2019 Spring: 8.901, Graduate Astrophysics I (i.e., all astrophysics inside the Galaxy). Course of 17: some undergraduate and more graduate students.
  • 2018 Fall: 8.01, Classical mechanics. Course of around 100 mostly first-year students of all majors.
  • 2018 Spring: 8.02, Classical Electromagnetism. Course of around 90 mostly first-year students of all majors.
  • 2017 Fall: 8.01, Classical mechanics. Course of around 100 mostly first-year students of all majors.

CfAO Educational Activities:

Various classroom activities I have helped to design, and professional development workshops I have attended.

Fourier Optics Lab

With teammates Sylvana Yelda and Tuan Do I led a redesign of the Fourier Optics Lab for the CfAO Adaptive Optics Summer School. The Fourier Optics Lab is a three-hour laboratory activity to acquaint participants with some of the fundamental qualitative principles of wave optics. The lab also gives practical hands-on experience with simple optical systems. To expose each group to a greater number of phenomena relating to Fourier Optics, each group also has several opportunities to discuss their observations and challenges with other participants.

You can download the entire lesson plan and adapt it to your own use (11 MB PDF).

Digital Images Inquiry

With teammates Katie Morzinski and Chris Crockett I designed an inquiry-based learning activity focusing on Digital Images for the Maui Community College Inst rumentation course in Fall 2008.

You can download the entire lesson plan and adapt it to your own use (8 MB PDF).

CfAO Professional Development Program

"Participants work on a design team during and after the workshop, continue developing skills through mini-workshops and expert consultation, and put their new teaching skills into practice. The practical teaching experience takes place in "teaching labs" -- CfAO-affiliated educational programs or courses. PDP participants leave the program as highly trained, innovative, and reflective scientist/engineer educators." -- CfAO PDP Website

Graduate Teaching Assistant Positions (UCLA):

Astronomy 180: Practical Observing

Astronomy 82: Stellar Evolution, Galaxies, and Cosmology

Astronomy 6: Cosmology: Our changing concepts of the universe

I was the Teaching Assistant for this course, which was taught by Prof. Ned Wright in Winter 2008. I led weekly discussion sections and three two-hour exam review sessions. On the whole, standard physical science problem-solving was eschewed in favor of more conceptual discussions of the course material. In addition, I regularly distributed handouts describing recent discoveries and advances in cosmology, and we discussed their significance and relevance to the course.

Astronomy 3: Astronomy Lab for Non-science Majors

I helped update the course materials for this lab, and served as TA for two quarters. (Course materials website)