Teaching Philosophy

When I first became a TA, I remember the professor who hired me saying that `teaching' was the wrong way to think about the job. The term `teaching' sets up the idea of one person being in charge and information flowing in one direction from the teacher to the student. Instead, she told me to think about my role as a facilitator of student learning. This subtle shift in mindset has developed into the core of my teaching philosophy. My goal is to design lessons and assignments to give students more ownership of their education, which in my experience, leads to better learning outcomes for students.



Complete Teaching Statement (pdf)

Past Teaching Experience

Throughout my undergraduate and graduate programs, I have been a teaching assistant for a wide variety of business and mathematics classes. In addition to my experience with these courses, I have taught several undergraduate course review sessions to benefit the charity Students Offering Support. I have also worked with the Centre for Education in Mathematics and Computing's Math Circles enrichment program for young students. A complete list of the courses I have worked as a TA for is below.

Yale University

MGT 409 - Operations Engine

MGT 611 - Policy Modeling

MGT 809 - Advanced Business Analytics

MGT 819 - Big Data

MGT 872  - Managing Sustainable Operations

Wilfrid Laurier University

BU 111 - Understanding the Business Environment

BU 121 - Functional Areas of the Organization

BU 395 - Operations II

BU 398 - Organizational Behaviour II

BU 401/461U - Competition Case Analysis & Presentation

BU 491 - Policy II

University of Waterloo

MATH 124 - Calculus & Vector Algebra for Kinesiology

MATH 136 - Linear Algebra I

MATH 235 - Linear Algebra II

MATH 239 - Introduction to Combinatorics

Selected Student Testimonials

Thank you for going the extra mile to help us understand things.

 -Graduate student at Yale University

My knowledge about the course has significantly benefited from his teaching. I have nothing to criticize. He makes and 8:30 am Monday morning lab a class I look forward to attending each week.

-Undergraduate student at Wilfrid Laurier University

He is extremely knowledgeable about the material and how it relates to the world [and] helped us to better understand concepts by providing real world applications.

-Undergraduate student at the University of Waterloo

Very patient, clear in his explanation, and constructive without giving away the answers [to assignments]

-Graduate student at Yale University

Michael was very knowledgeable and effectively helped to transfer that knowledge to the class. He was always helpful, and helped to make labs fun.

-Undergraduate student at Wilfrid Laurier University