About Me

"Always."

- Severus Snape

Dear student,

This page was created out of sheer vanity - just kidding! I thought this would be a helpful space for students who are 1. interested in enrolling in my course, 2. currently enrolled and wondering whether to stay, and 3. curious about who my values as an educator. I think it is important for students to see who I am. It affects how I grade, how I treat students, and how I resolve disputes. 

Though students call me Professor Dinh, I was born Alexander (Alex) Hung Quoc Dinh at Sharp Hospital off Interstate 163 in San Diego, California. I am the proud product of Vietnamese immigrants. My mother and father fled the former nation of South Vietnam and the encroaching red tide of Ho Chi Minh's uniquely hostile brand of Communism. They were refugees, inspired by the rhetoric of American promise, seeking new chances they saw extinguished in their motherland. My story began with their love. They raised me with lower-middle class values, enrolling me in the San Diego Unified School district, the most expansive public district in the city. I am proud to say that I am a product of public education, the kind some, at times rightfully, spurn.

My secondary schooling at Patrick Henry High set me on a path toward my God-given mission in life. I was 15 when the teaching bug bit. Some friends and I started an after-school tutoring program called Tutoring 4 Triumph. We invited students of all ages to receive extra tutoring after school at a local library once a week, a routine we upheld up to the final weeks of our senior year. I loved the experience, but I was not ready at the time to commit to a lifelong teaching career. Nevertheless, the spark remained lit inside, and I took it with me to college.

The summer between my first and second year at UCLA was when I decided to pursue a career as an educator. I was 19. Detesting what I perceived to be needless competition and self-centeredness exhibited by pre-medical students, I embraced the community, collaboration, and nobility of educators. The spark ignited from high school grew from an ember into a conflagration as I continued nurturing this teaching craft. Toward my senior year, I was lucky to be admitted into a Masters of Education and Teaching Credentially Program at the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at UCLA. One year later, I earned my M.Ed and started my teaching career as a high school biology teacher at Downtown Magnets High School (DMHS). This site was the perfect place - low-income, serving historically-marginalized communities of color, in an urban setting. These were the sorts of sites most educators avoid, owing to its immense challenge. And so it was precisely where I needed to be.

Fast-forwarding, because this is getting long, 8 years at DMHS taught me incredible lessons. One example, I learned that my body of work revolves around three core tenets: 1) student-centered teaching, 2) civic engagement, and 3) mentorship. My craft is less about the transfer of knowledge than enriching student lives, understanding their funds and experiences such that new knowledge is intelligible. I aim for students to feel visible, relevant, empowered. In my class, we demystify education, cutting the shroud that has kept communities across the U.S. from opportunites to advance faithfully. TBC.