University Teaching
I have been lucky to teach a variety of courses that I have designed since 2011 at Arizona State University in several departments: Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College, School for the Future of Innovation in Society, and School of Sustainability.
I get really excited to teach through non-traditional and new pedagogies (hybrid, fully online, self-paced, and in-person: PBL, guided instruction, & problem-solving). Each of my classes has a different way of coming together that makes them an exploration worth sharing, refining, and many times replicating.
University Courses
Sustainability Science and Society (SOS 294) - Spring 2022 semester live now!
This course explores global and local sustainability topics by taking students on a virtual tour of the world through various engaging digital stories. From Phoenix to Bali case studies, this course uncovers diverse approaches used by scientists, scholars, and practitioners to study and assess human-environment interactions pertaining to sustainability challenges and solutions. Students will learn critical thinking skills that will foster better engagement with the world around them through the lens of sustainability.
ArtScience: COVID Response (HUL 494) - Spring 2021
The Humanities Lab at ASU is where students can engage in hands-on, exploratory, question-based learning as they tackle grand social challenges, such as How should ArtScience respond to COVID-19? If ArtScience offers new ways of knowing, seeing, being, and doing, how can it help navigate crises, build resilience, and shape the future? Labs are taught by interdisciplinary teams of faculty who work alongside students in collaborative teams to produce outcomes—proposed problem solutions—shared publicly. Putting the humanities at the center of inquiry means getting beneath the surface of challenges and grappling with the ideas, beliefs, assumptions, and confusions that underlie and perpetuate problems. Working with other disciplines widens the inquiry, expands resources and expertise, and improves solutions. Students can be from any major or background, working at any level of their academic programs. It’s called a Lab because teams work together to address a common problem, and class periods are more like workshops than typical lecture sessions.
Analyzing the social dimensions of sustainability (HSD 598)
In this graduate seminar, students read, discuss, and write about sustainability and society, with the aim of discovering how sustainability ideas animate our interests and scholarship. We will work to gain a deeper understanding of the human, cultural, and sociotechnological dimensions of sustainability from an interdisciplinary perspective. As a class, we will challenge the many existing theoretical frameworks associated with sustainability and work to situate our own thinking through a better understanding of these lenses.
Sustainability Science Technology and Society (SCN 401)
Is an all online course that explores the Explores the challenges and cross-connections of science and society through the lens of sustainability. Prepares students to think and engage critically with the world around them. Seeks sustainable solutions through science, technology, and society acting at global and local levels.
Sustainability Science for Teachers (SCN 400)
Explores the challenges of sustaining human health and well-being on Earth due to human exploitation of natural resources. This hybrid/blended class focuses on how to teach sustainability concepts in the K-8 classroom through digital stories, engaging hands on activities in class, and project based learning (PBL).
21st Century Skills and Learning (HON 394)
I have co-taught, and learned alongside our Barrett Honors students, with 2001 Nobel Laureate Dr. Lee Hartwell in this HON 394 course. The motivation for this course is to aid students in becoming successful agents in the society of the 21st Century. My assumptions about the society of the future are derived from the trends of the present. What seems clear is that the future will present humanity with unprecedented problems and unimaginable solutions. University graduates will need to be problem solvers and life-long learners in an era of formidable challenges and accelerating change.