Engaged Teaching Consultants and English Language Instructors

Rebecca Hardesty is a PhD Candidate in Communication and Science Studies Program where her research focuses on how expert biologists train novices to design and assess experiments using animal models. During her time at the Teaching + Learning Commons, Rebecca has trained graduate students, and published a paper on, how to conduct participant-observation ethnography in classrooms (2018a). She has also collaborated with faculty on SoTL projects on STEM courses (2018b). She is currently involved in a long-term project designing methods and metrics of assessment for the Engaged Teaching Hub’s pedagogical curriculum and has, so far, presented this work at SABER West. Rebecca is committed to drawing on her knowledge, and experience with, evidence-based teaching practices in helping instructors of all levels further develop their pedagogical skills. She is particularly interested in working with instructors to implement student-centered teaching, design syllabi, interpet CAPEs/student evaluations, and get involved in SoTL research.

Alex’s goal at the in Engaged Teaching Hub is to improve the teaching experience of his fellow graduate students and post-docs. He has served as a TA, Lab TA Coordinator, and instructor of record for the UC San Diego physics department, during which time he designed and wrote a new lab manual for the department's introductory circuits lab. Outside of the physics department, Alex applied his training in scholarly teaching to complete a Teaching-as-Research project during his time as a Summer Graduate Teaching Scholar with the Engaged Teaching Hub. He has since served as a mentor for new Summer Graduate Teaching Scholars and is committed to seeing the participants develop as instructors. His work as a Graduate Instructional Designer will help to provide resources and services for graduate students to improve and expand their teaching. Alex received his Bachelor of Arts in Physics from Dartmouth College and is pursuing his PhD in physics at UC San Diego.

Zoe Nemerever is a PhD candidate in the department of Political Science, where she serves as the Senior TA in American Politics. Prior to joining the Engaged Teaching Hub she led discussion sections for POLI 30: Political Inquiry and POLI 10: Introduction to American Politics. Her research focuses on the quality of rural representation by state and national political parties.

Omar Padilla is a PhD candidate in the department of Ethnic Studies.

Omar’s teaching experience includes TA in the Dimensions of Culture (DOC) writing program for Thurgood Marshall College, and TA in the Ethnic Studies Department. Omar has taught as Instructor of Record for “ETHN 182: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Fantasy and Science Fiction” participated in the Summer Graduate Teaching Scholar program during Summer 2018. Omar currently teaches in the Department of Chicano Studies at San Diego City College.

I am a second year graduate student pursuing a PhD in Physics. I work with Dr. Tom Murphy at Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences on the Apache Point Observatory Lunar Laser-ranging Operation (APOLLO) Project, where we shoot a giant 500 pound laser on the Moon using which we can measure the distance between the Earth and Moon down to 1 millimeter! That's pretty small! I also enjoy reading a good book, playing outdoors and running! I am still finding my feet at T+LC but I enjoy teaching and am currently working to design Workshops for International Students! The dog in the picture is Joey, who's a very good boy!

Amrah Salomon J. is a writer, artist, activist, and educator of Mexican, Native American (Akimel O’odham and Tohono O'odham descendant, not enrolled), and European ancestry. Amrah grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and is now a PhD candidate in Ethnic Studies at University of California, San Diego. She teaches online and at local universities in Indigenous Studies, Chicanx/Latinx Studies, Gender Studies, Literature/Creative Writing, and Ethnic Studies. Amrah is a co-founder of the youth open mic space Rez Beats and her work has been published in both academic and literary publications in the United States and in Mexico. Amrah also works as a private consultant providing anti-oppression, diversity, and community organizing trainings. She also provides transformative justice mediation facilitation and organizational strategic planning, program evaluation, and problem-solving consultation. ​

Katherine Steelman (PhD student, UC San Diego, Ethnic studies) is a English language instructor, cultural historian and writer. Broadly, her work examines how sexually non-normative spaces are socially and materially constructed in Tijuana, BC, MX. She takes up US cultural production, as well as the Tijuanense response to the US's narrative of the city and it's communities that might be called queer. This work juxtaposes critical analyses of cultural texts with ethnographic interviews. Currently, she is working on a project that engages cultural representations of Haiti in the US and Mexico, as well as collaborative ethnographic work with Haitian migrants in Tijuana.

Melissa Troyer is a PhD candidate in the Kutas Cognitive Electrophysiology Lab in the department of Cognitive Science, where her research focuses on the role of background knowledge and expertise in real-time language processing. Melissa has been a teaching assistant in the Cognitive Science departments at Indiana University, MIT, and UCSD. She has also taught as instructor of record for COGS 101C, Language, at UCSD, and has recently guest lectured in the Cognitive Science, Linguistics, and Human Development departments at UCSD and in the Psychology program at Holy Names University.

Torus Washington II is a 2nd Year PhD student in the Nanoengineering program where his research broadly focuses on nanomedicine and targeted cancer therapies. He completed his undergraduate education at Georgia Institute of Technology (2010-2015) and his Master’s at University of Central Florida (2015-2017). He has served as TA in a Nanoengineering probability and statistics course here at UCSD. His primary teaching interests include the role of student interest in learning as well as teaching for knowledge retention. He is currently working on a manuscript describing Piazza usage of UCSD Computer science and engineering (CSE) students in addition to designing and facilitating teaching chats, assessing and crafting a narrative of course design studio feedback, designing workshops, and brainstorming and formulating improvements to the current UCSD IA modules.