Teaching

Teaching Philosophy

I believe that students bring valuable perspectives and interests to political science that they can use to engage with research and to further develop interests and skills that will be broadly applicable. My chief goal in the classroom is to help students find how they can contribute to political science research in ways that are relevant to real world problems and important to their own values and career goals.

Course Listing

Causes of War and Peace: Comparative/IR. Cross-list communication studies. Upper-division community engaged course in collaboration with non-profit bicycle repair shop on leadership development. Students learn about leadership approaches during the Bosnian War and relate them to their own leadership style. Each student teaches repair skills and manages bicycle shop while engaging in conversations about leadership in war and peace.
International Relations: IR. Lower-division course with State Department simulation of international crises. Teams work together to respond to crises in the context of problems in international relations. Significant research component focusing on developing a literature review. Apply several international relations theories to the literature review topic.
Comparative Political Economy: Comparative. Cross-list economics. Upper-division course designed as a book club. Students read journalistic accounts about topics in political economy and conduct research on their application to their community, presenting these applications as they teach each class session. Large creative, art-based project on comparative political economy.
First Year Experience: Exploring the Arts and Sciences: Common course taught to humanities and social science majors. Team taught with student mentor. Focus on vocational discernment, building civic skills, career development, and introducing the liberal arts.
Data Analysis in Social Science: Methods. Cross-list sociology, criminal justice. Major capstone course for all political science and sociology majors. Teaches basic statistical concepts and research design to enable students to write full research article and collect and analyze observational data using R. Qualitative, community engaged project using interviews or focus groups to address an issue on campus.
American Politics I: American. Introductory course largely for non-majors focused on national, state, and local government with an emphasis on building civic knowledge and democratic citizenship. Social science research project introducing the basic principles of the research process. Community engaged group project to address a problem students identify in their community and to take a small step to sustainably address the problem.
Civic Engagement and Political Behavior: American. Independent study course teaching literature on political behavior and civic engagement in the United States with a focus on collecting original data and producing scholarly research.
Research and Data Analysis in Vocational Studies: Methods. Independent study course teaching qualitative and quantitative methods for analyzing survey and focus group responses about vocation. Prepared and presented report to senior administrators.
Public Administration: American/Public Administration. Cross-list communication studies, social innovation and social entrepreneurship. Upper-division community lab course on the bureaucracy’s role in immigration policy implementation. Photo voice assignment demonstrating individual artistic connections to the topic. Close reading of primary source policy and government documents.
Asia and Development: Comparative/Judicial. Cross-list economics, social innovation and social entrepreneurship. Upper-division research lab course focused on the legal aspects of the politics of development through legal research and simulation. Special emphasis is given to development in Asia and comparisons with other countries. Students prepare, brief, and try an actual case involving development issues in both the U.S. and Asia.
Comparative Politics: Comparative. Lower-division course with Model United Nations simulation. Teams work together to represent the interests of their selected countries through proposed legislation and simulated crises. Significant research component focusing on developing a literature review. Construct a piece of draft legislation focused on addressing comparative politics problems identified in the literature review.
Legal Research and Policy Analysis: Judicial/Public Policy. Independent study course integrating both basic legal research and writing principles and the impact of those principles on policymaking. Produced legal whitepaper used by NECU, the governing body of Lutheran schools.
Environmental Politics: Comparative/Public Policy. Upper-division research seminar on environmental politics, policy, and administration. Conduct sustainability audit of campus using skills related to science policy and communication later used by sustainability committee to guide sustainability strategy.
Qualitative Research Methods and Writing: Methods. Independent study course teaching the components of qualitative analysis of focus group data, as well as reporting writing and presentation skills. Developed and presented report on student engagement to senior administrators.
Legal Research and Writing: Judicial/Methods. Independent study course on the components of legal documents, strategies for approaching and outlining cases and arguments, and conducting basic legal research.
Electoral Politics: Comparative/Public Policy. Upper-division civic engagement seminar focused on developing and delivering deliberative dialogue programming to students on campus to address campus and community issues. Understanding of different approaches to regime and electoral system design through student-led simulated class sessions.
Nationalism and Political Behavior: American/Comparative. Independent study course introducing key literature in the study of nationalism, particularly as it applies to political behavior in the United States. Collected and analyzed original data for scholarly presentation.
Politics of Developing Nations: Comparative/Judicial. Senior-level research seminar in comparative politics with a research project on judicial politics culminating in a simulated trial.
Intelligence Policy and Analysis: IR/Public Policy. Senior-level simulation where students prepare briefings and present briefs as intelligence analyst teams. Focus on learning briefing skills and their application to current U.S. foreign policy.
Representation, Identity, and Community: Comparative/American. Senior-level community engagement seminar. Students collectively produced a proposal to increase community engagement on campus by teaching civic knowledge, promoting voter registration and engagement, and developing community involvement. Proposal presented to university President and began campus community engagement initiatives.
Scope and Methods in the Social Sciences: Methods. Major capstone course. Build research design and methods skills in a scaﬀolded manner so students collect and analyze data and write a full research article. Introduction to R computer programming and basic statistics. Qualitative group project where students interview community members and analyze qualitative data.
Representation, Identity, and Dissent: Comparative/American. Junior-level online seminar taught with synchronous and asynchronous components. Legislative policy-making simulation with research-based briefing paper and interviews with community members. Student-led project partnering with community organization to develop training to teach local youth about identity-based discrimination and how to contact their representatives about their concerns.
Immigration, Identity, and the Internet (Co-Instructor): Comparative/American. Senior-level seminar; fulfills writing intensive requirement. Team taught. Redesigned course to scaffold writing assignments and to introduce new literature. Local policy simulation with qualitative interviews. Incorporated active learning and reflection. Individual writing tutorials with students. Reflective reading journals.
Internship Supervisor: All majors are required to complete an internship. Work with students to identify appropriate internships, teach internship success skills, and monitor progress.