Teaching
As detailed in my CV, teaching has been an important facet of my academic career. Collected here are resources regarding my teaching, both current, past, and pedagogical.
This spring of 2026, I am a graduate teaching assistant for MTH 314: Matrix Algebra. Students may access course resources through D2L, submit questions to Piazza, or contact me directly. I will also be available two hours per week for online office hours; the exact schedule is currently under development.
Past assignments teaching differential equations and linear algebra required designing and delivering lectures. I plan to make the resulting lecture notes available here. This will require some post-processing as I convert physical documents to a form appropriate for online presentation. They should be available following the first major website update.
I design my lectures according to three core principles:
Theory should be developed from practice.
In "the real world," one observes an example of a phenomenon, then determines the critical features of that phenomenon, and finally defines the mathematical objects realizing those features. I structure my lectures to reproduce this process. Many math texts present information in the reverse order: first definitions, then properties, and finally examples. While this works well for more advanced abstract topics, I find it obscures the motivation and intuition behind key ideas. Instead, beginning with examples lends practical relevance to a subject, and identifying key properties helps students develop mathematical intuition prior to the explicit presentation of a general theory.
In-person instruction should complement available resources.
I aim to present material in a fundamentally different manner than course textbooks or online resources. Reversing the order of presentation is one such example. Not only does it align with my personal beliefs regarding math education, but it also provides students with another perspective. Those students who learn well from textbooks have online access to my courses' textbooks; those who struggle with textbooks have an alternative in my lectures. The digitization of learning materials and development of online education platforms broaden access to textbooks, notes, and similar resources, and thus provide instructors the opportunity to expand teaching styles. I leverage these technological advancements to enhance the learning experience.
Learning math occurs at the individual scale.
I strongly believe the greatest determinant of success in math education is motivation, which varies significantly from student to student. One of my most recent courses included students from nine different majors, each with their own interests and passions. To appeal to as many students as possible, I strive to construct examples inspired by a diversity of subjects. For example, in a summer course in linear algebra, I opened lectures with examples from agriculture, navigation, cryptography, construction, and logistics, to name a few. I find designing math problems in such a variety of contexts inherently fun, but it also serves to make the subject more relevant to a diverse student audience.
To encapsulate the underlying tone of my teaching, I find math fascinating and enjoyable, and I want to share that attitude with my students. I enjoy reverse-engineering familiar math concepts, searching for fresh perspectives, and fitting math to individuals' particular interests. I hope students graduate from my courses sharing that enjoyment of learning math.