Biography

I have been at UC Merced since 2006, when I was hired as founding faculty in the Biology Program. I have experience developing and implementing novel and effective teaching methodologies designed to improve student compression and mastery of class material. I have been flipping my upper division biology courses since Fall 2014. The first course I flipped was The Cell (Bio110), an upper division cell biology course required of all biology majors. This was extremely successful and in Fall 2015, I began teaching General Microbiology (Bio120) using flipped pedagogy. I created student-centered active learning activities that promote critical thinking, problem solving and group work. In my courses, I use clicker technology to assess student’s understanding of the material via in class questions. Also, quizzes are administered in lecture using clickers. I am currently teaching Bio120 in the Technology Enabled Active Learning (TEAL) Lab, taking advantage of the room’s technological tools to enhance group work activities, effective delivery of course content as well as in depth comprehension of concepts. Together, these innovations in the classroom translated to increase student performance and understanding of the material.

As the Biology Major Faculty Assessment Organizer, I’m intimately familiar with the biology major’s programmatic learning outcomes, their core competencies, and how to assess them effectively. This has influenced the way in which I carry out my own course assessment, focusing on mastery of global concepts. With these in mind, I create assessment questions and exercises that span high Bloom’s taxonomy levels.