Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning

Courses you Teach

Courses on drug policy, Maine state government, democratic theory, and an innovative year-long seminar where students collaborate with community partners to conduct applied policy research. 

Tell us a bit about you

What’s a surprising fact most people don’t know about you? 
I struggled academically upon first arriving at college and was on academic and disciplinary probation simultaneously (basically inches away from getting drummed out of school). It wasn’t until I found subject matter about which I was passionate and professors that inspired me that I became a “good student.” This is information I share with students when they’re stressing about the first B- in their academic careers. It’s a helpful reminder not to sweat the small stuff. 

What’s something you have always wanted to learn, but haven’t yet?
Portuguese. I speak a bit…badly (we run a study abroad program every summer in Lisbon). But I’d really love to be able to speak at a more advanced level (and it doesn’t help that so many people in Portugal speak English fluently and kindly shift to it when they see you struggling. But I’m working on it). 

What’s something you’d walk across campus in a snowstorm for? 
Honestly (and this is going to sound corny), but teaching a class. No matter what is going on in your personal life, the weather, the world around us, teaching requires a focus that makes that fade into the background.

Tell us a bit about your approach to teaching

If your teaching (or research) had a theme song, what would it be? 
There’s a song called “Grace Under Pressure” by the UK band Elbow. It is almost like two entirely different songs meshed together–one really beautiful and one frenetic and chaotic. In my discipline, the best teaching (and the best research) finds the through line in what seems like chaos and renders it legible and comprehensible. The song is a good representation of that.  

What’s the most surprising thing a student has ever taught you? 
How to compost organic waste. I advised a student’s thesis that was about state and community-level strategies to reduce food waste as a means of climate change mitigation. I think of that student literally every time I walk our food scraps out to our (very impressive) composting set-up in the backyard. 

What’s something you would secretly love to teach, even if it has nothing to do with your field? 
At the end of high school, I was either going to study political science (with the intent of going to law school–which later morphed into getting a PhD and becoming a professor) OR I was going to music school for composition. Realistically, I likely would have ended up doing something with music production or engineering. Though that’s not the path I took, I’d love to teach a course where we listen to and unpack the way contemporary music is made/recorded at a really granular level. 

What historical figure would you most like to co-teach a course with? 
George Orwell. I’ve taught an upper-level seminar numerous times where we read basically all of his major works. People know 1984 and Animal Farm but there’s so much more than that–lots of really astute observations on class, war, social relations, political rhetoric, and even just the craft of writing. And he’s FUNNY–in a subtle, very dry and British sort of way which is not what most people think of with Orwell. We’d teach the heck out of a class together. 

How would you describe what you feel to be meaningful changes to your course design or approaches to teaching that have emerged as you have grown as an instructor?  
My earliest courses were structured and choreographed in a way that didn’t give students autonomy to drive the direction of the class (even if students didn’t fully realize it–it might have seemed natural and organic, but it was deliberately set up to seem that way). Part of my evolution as an instructor has been relinquishing control and letting students have more flexibility in what they choose to study and what any individual class or experience is going to look like. 

How would you describe the impact of these changes on the students in your classes?  
At its best, this strategy ignites a spark in students that I feel is far more effective than regimented “instruction.” I’ve seen students pursue the projects about which they are passionate into advanced study, their professional careers, advocating for meaningful change in their communities, taking on positions of leadership and power. 

As a result of this work, what has changed for you as an instructor and/or colleague in terms of your own teaching. 
So much. I’d say the key thing is having the courage to deploy new things in the classroom that are challenging or unconventional. I’d also say it’s important to recognize that we can never fully control what resonates with a student or is the catalyst for some other thing they’re going to do in their life. So that requires mindfulness and intentionality in really every interaction we have with our students (and is part of why being a professor is so exhausting, but also incredibly rewarding). 

What would be a piece of advice you might give a new instructor at UMaine? 
Don’t be too hard on yourself. Allow yourself the grace and flexibility to grow and evolve as an instructor. You’ll try things that will fail or not work out as you’d hoped, but the very fact that this is happening shows you’re disrupting what is “comfortable.” And be transparent with the students about that–they’ll respect and appreciate that honesty (and they’re really good at sniffing out inauthenticity).