Teaching Statement

At the University of Illinois—a world-class public research institution—our mission is to both educate professionals to fulfill the needs of the US workforce and train the next generation of researchers and academics. My teaching philosophy is driven by the need to accomplish these two tasks and to strike a balance between them. Additionally, research and classroom education are highly intertwined at Illinois, which puts us in a perfect position to raise societal awareness of the importance of higher education.

Since my arrival at Illinois in 2008, I have pursued the above teaching vision in several ways. In the last nine years I have had the opportunity to teach several courses both at the undergraduate and graduate levels. I have also supervised several research projects at the undergraduate and graduate level, and three former Ph.D. students are now faculty members at several universities across North America.