my personal philosphy on pedagogical practices in astronomy

teaching is a fundamental pillar of academia (obviously!). you can't really have a career as a scientist without teaching responsibilities. i personally love teaching, it's a big reason i want to have a lifelong career in academia. i believe that astronomy should be taught in the most accessible and engaging fashion possible. many people, including those with limited backgrounds in math/science, will find themselves taking an astronomy class at some point. this means that astronomy often faces problems such as lack of math/physics preperation, large class sizes, and/or large disparities in background knowledge among the class.

i believe that inclusion in astronomy is especially important, and this inclusion can be fostered effectively at the undergraduate level through inclusive teaching practices, open minded instructors, and acknowledgement of bias/discrimination in the field. astronomy is a very classical example of an 'old boy's sport', hence it hasn't been until recently that the field has started to fix underlying issues producing the vast disparity in gender/race seen in the field.

teaching i am/was involved in

• research experience in astronomy for teachers (2025)
• during july 2025 i helped run a 4-week course for K-12 public school teachers in the springfield, massachusetts area. the course educated the teachers on some of the basics of astronomy (we focused mostly on stars/ star formation) for the purpose of helping them teach astronomy material in their own classrooms! this program was run as part of an NSF broader impacts grant held by my advisor professor daniela calzetti. i was one of the instructional assistants, and ran one of our lab sections alongside umass undergraduate Catherine McCaffrey.
• physics, math, comp. sci. tutor (2022-2024)
• during my time as an undergraduate i held a part time math/physics/comp. sci. tutoring position at washtenaw community college (wcc). for two years i worked part time, tutoring across a wide range of content. i helped wcc students tackle math ranging from addition and subtraction up to differential equations and linear algebra! i tutored for all of wcc's physics classes (4 total, algebra and calculus based physics I and II) and some of their computer science courses (mostly python, c++, html, or unix computing).
• lab instructor (2023-2024)
• in the 2023 and 2024 academic years i was a regular instructor for astro 101, 102, and 201 labs at the university of michigan. 101 and 102 are your standard intro to astronomy classes, while 201 was a more comprehensive 'intro to astrophysics' course. several of the labs involved taking astronomical observations with the school's telescopes. i was mostly involved with these labs, acting as a telescope operator, question answerer, and set up/pack up personnel. through these courses i got to engage with students across a range of background, from which i learned a tremendous amount about hands-on astronomy instruction.
• michigan math & science scholars (2023-2024)
• in the summers of 2023 and 2024 i was an undergraduate instructor for a michigan math and science scholars course (MMSS for short). my undergraduate research advisor (professor monica valluri) ran an intensive two week course on the astrophysics of dark matter and black holes for high school students. our students came from a wide range of countries and educational backgrounds. the diversity in students made the course super fun to teach, and i can confidently say that both the instructors and students all had a blast both summers.
  
  i ran the lab sections of the course with the graduate student instructor of the course. we designed and taught a basic python course for the students, with a focus on applications to astronomy. the students got to work with a mix of real and simulated data, learn a variety of techniques used by astronomers, and make a final poster presentation about a real science project they undertook in the final week!