Teaching
Overview of teaching accomplishments
As an H. Milton Stewart Ph.D. Student Teaching Fellow, I served as the instructor-of-record for the course ISyE 3232: Stochastic Manufacturing and Service Systems, which introduces students to various stochastic models and analysis methods, including newsvendor model, queueing theory, discrete- and continuous-time Markov chains, and Poisson processes. My efforts toward teaching excellence were well-received by my students and more supporting evidence can be found below.
I am also honored to be recognized by the ISyE Outstanding GTA (Graduate Teaching Assistant) Award for my teaching and service, as well as my participation in the curriculum development for the nation’s largest Senior Design program (offered twice a year with an average enrollment of 170 students per semester). During my 8-semester service, I facilitated the senior design projects for over 1,000 students and assisted the team of over 10 faculty members. I provided feedback and mentoring on technical content and professional communication to final-year undergraduate students on their projects with industry clients. Furthermore, I taught simulation analysis, network theory, data science, business analytics, systems engineering, and linear algebra as a graduate or undergraduate teaching assistant.
Experience
Graduate Student Instructor
ISyE 3232 Stochastic Manufacturing and Service Systems (4.6/5.0 with a class size of 28), Summer 2022
Graduate Teaching Assistant
ISyE 4800/4106 (Pre-) Senior Design (Average cohort size of 170 per semester), Spring/Fall 2023, Fall 2022, Spring/Fall 2021, Spring/Fall 2020, Summer/Fall 2019
ISyE 3044 Simulation Analysis and Design, Summer 2021
ISyE 3232 Stochastic Manufacturing and Service Systems, Spring 2019, Fall 2018
Undergraduate Teaching Assistant
SUTD 40.011 Data and Business Analytics, Fall 2017
SUTD 10.004 Advanced Mathematics II, Spring 2017
SUTD 10.007 Modeling the Systems World, Fall 2016
Student Feedback
I am very grateful that my efforts have been well received by my students. My students have highlighted the following strengths of mine: availability, care, enthusiasm, flexibility, knowledge, and organization. The students rated my overall effectiveness as 4.6 out of 5.0, my enthusiasm as 4.7 out of 5.0, my inclusiveness as 4.8 out of 5.0, my availability as 4.8 out of 5.0, and the helpfulness of my feedback as 4.6 out of 5.0. The scores are well above the department averages. Some anonymous feedback from the CIOS (Course Instructor Opinion Survey) is quoted below.
You may click on the dropdown menu to see them :)
"Professor Liu is incredible; she did a fantastic job and obviously cares very much about this class, and cares even more about her students. I really really REALLY appreciate her. She’s answered every question I’ve had with care and consideration, took the time to cater to each student, and offers lots of compassion, which is sometimes a rarity at GT. She's awesome :)"
"You have been one of my best professors at Tech! I thought you were a great teacher and were particularly good at reexplaining concepts in a different way if we didn’t understand it the first time. I also thought it was considerate of you to adapt the course as we went to give us what we needed most, and it was very kind of you to offer alternatives to the class after the first midterm. I learned a lot in this course and I feel confident about understanding, which is a great place to be since this course material is very difficult!"
"She is obviously very knowledgeable on the material, and I could tell she wanted us to succeed in the class. That type of enthusiasm is not always found in instructors, but it helped my morale when I was struggling in the beginning of this class."
"Well organized and prepared instructor! The teaching content is well explained so students can make connections in between topics. She’s highly accessible in person as well as virtual for questions!"
"Lectures were well organized and clear. They were easy to follow despite some topics being difficult to understand."
"She was very nice and seemed very enthusiastic about the subject matter. It made the lectures a lot easier to watch than professors that drone on and on in the same boring voice. A professor seeming happy and energetic helps a lot!"