Teaching

Teaching Statement

My teaching philosophy emphasizes helping students understand the what, how, and why of finance. The “what” is the intellectual foundation students need to understand financial concepts. The “how” comprises the technical skills, particularly Excel and AI, needed to apply those concepts. The “why” is the capacity to think critically about a problem, select an appropriate approach, and reach a defensible solution. My goal is to develop all three dimensions through practical, experiential learning.

This philosophy reflects both my professional experience and my conversations with students. Employers expect graduates to understand concepts such as financial statements, valuation, and net present value, but they also value employees who can analyze data and implement solutions using modern tools. Technical proficiency alone is insufficient, however. The most successful professionals understand why a method is appropriate, recognize when its assumptions fail, and adapt it to unfamiliar problems. This is particularly true with AI tools. My courses therefore combine financial knowledge with technical practice and open-ended decision-making.

I often ask students to bring their laptops to class so that we can build an analytical tool together. In my personal finance course, for example, students used information from the IRS to construct a dynamic Excel model calculating federal income taxes across different income levels. We then expanded the model as we studied the earned income tax credit, child tax credit, childcare expenses, mortgage-interest deductions, and other provisions. By the end of the project, students had learned the relevant tax concepts, strengthened their Excel skills, and confronted the practical challenge of translating complicated rules into a functional model.

This approach makes technical instruction part of learning finance rather than a separate exercise. Students must decide how to represent a concept, identify the information the model requires, test whether the output is reasonable, and revise the model when new complications arise. By the end of my courses, students who began with little Excel experience have become comfortable using nested formulas, producing well-formatted graphs and tables, creating basic macros, and writing simple VBA functions. I support this classroom work with short video tutorials that I post on youtube that allow students to reconstruct models at their own pace. 

Student responses provide evidence that this approach works. My teaching evaluations have consistently exceeded departmental averages. More meaningfully, students have told me that skills developed in my courses helped them secure internships and jobs or contribute more effectively in their existing positions. These outcomes are especially satisfying because they show that students can transfer what they learn beyond a particular assignment or examination.

Teaching Evaluations

Finance With Excel Videos