Certification in College Teaching

As a graduate student at Michigan State, I had the opportunity to participate in the Certification in College Teaching program. In this program, through professional development activities (workshops or seminars, coursework in disciplinary teaching methods, a mentored teaching project), participants build and consolidate their preparation for college and university teaching. The program culminates in an e-portfolio. Mine is provided here.

You can view my Teaching Philosophy Statement here.

Competency 1:
Developing Discipline Related Teaching Strategies

  • Some aspects of teaching are universal (for instance, how do we get students to show up?), while others are discipline-specific. In preparation to become an effective educator, prospective teachers must consider both. In psychology specifically, educators need to consider the different challenges students may face in various subdisciplines (e.g., issues encountered with a statistics sequence will be vastly different from issues encountered in a writing course), anticipate these challenges, and develop skills and provide resources to help students navigate these challenges. Psychology educators also need to be prepared to deliver quality course content both in-person and online, as online psychology courses become more available to students. It is also important for psychology educators to collaborate with other educators across subdisciplines so they can share best practices, avoid “reinventing the wheel” in their courses, and work together to find solutions to common issues.

    To learn about psychology-specific teaching considerations, I completed a course in the Department of Psychology on Online Course Preparation (PSY 890) with Dr. Jonathan Weaver in spring of 2025. This course focused on issues specific to teaching various subdisciplines of psychology (e.g., personality, developmental, cognitive) and different styles of course design (e.g., lecture-based, writing courses). The course had a particular emphasis on the unique challenges of the online classroom.

  • Below are artifacts of and materials developed from this course, along with their rationale/importance:

    • Syllabus for PSY 890: This course was integral in helping prepare me to serve as the Instructor of Record for an online course in personality psychology. As seen in the PSY 890 syllabus, this course included lectures on topics such as handling AI use in the online classroom, ensuring ADA compliance online, maintaining professionalism, and understanding institutional classroom policies. We also discussed problems that can arise for learners when engaging in certain psychology courses (as noted above), and how instructors can best facilitate student success while considering different issues learners may encounter. Further, because students in the course were from multiple subfields within psychology, this gave us a unique opportunity to share insights with each other and troubleshoot unexpected issues together. Finally, the course had an emphasis on unique challenges of the online classroom context, such as handling student AI use. This is not an issue specific to the teaching of psychology, but is pervasive within psychology classrooms and poses a serious threat to student learning when used inappropriately. As a part of this course, we recognized the extremely difficult nature of dealing with AI use in the classroom, but also shared ideas for best practices on how to help students engage with AI in a constructive way.

    • Syllabus I created during PSY 890 (for PSY 236, Personality Psychology): Creating this syllabus for a personality psychology course I would teach the following semester gave me the opportunity to carefully think through multiple aspects of teaching and delivering course content. As the course I was teaching was online and not in the classroom, I had the opportunity to consider the unique challenges my students might face given the method of content delivery (e.g., time management, issues with engagement). As a result, I implemented various platforms/mechanisms students could leverage to maximize their success in the course as best fit them. For example, I offered flexible office hours to accommodate student schedules, provided resources for organization and time management, provided an interactive calendar of assignments in D2L, and communicated clearly and through multiple avenues (e.g., email, D2L posting) when deadlines were approaching or exams were near. Further, as I was teaching personality psychology, I had a unique opportunity to leverage students’ personal experience and genuine curiosity about themselves and others when designing course content (an example of a discipline-specific consideration in teaching). To help students engage with and feel connected to the material, I offered thought-provoking discussion post assignments and accompanying instructor-led videos about personality psychology in everyday life, and responded to each student’s post with questions, ideas, and additional thoughts.

  • As a student in the PSY 890 teaching course, I prepared my own online course, including creation of a syllabus, editing of existing course materials, revision of exam items to mitigate the efficacy of student AI use, and integration of new course content. This course proved immensely useful for thinking through various considerations for running my own course and provided me with the space needed to prepare materials to do so.

    Participating in this course was an advantage on multiple fronts. First, it permitted me to prepare my course in D2L. This was very practical, as it allowed me to learn how to use D2L and explore what functionality I could leverage as a course instructor before leading the course. I could also brainstorm and troubleshoot with others across subdisciplines within psychology (e.g., the other students and the instructor) on any technical or organizational issues within D2L. Second, this course provided me with the opportunity to thoroughly consider all course content, make revisions, add new content, etc., to make the course as accessible and engaging to students as possible. I was given the opportunity to consider potential struggles students may have unique to personality psychology or the online course context, and proactively establish ways to mitigate these issues. Again, I also benefited from being able to consult with other students and the instructor on best practices for various aspects of instruction (e.g., offering extra credit, timing of exams, when/how to provide office hours). Third, participating in this course provided me with insight into my own teaching practices, and as a young educator, helped me craft who I want to be as an educator going forward. For example, without this course I would have likely not considered leveraging humanity’s natural curiosity to understand others to try to boost engagement in my own online course (e.g., through the revamped discussion posts as noted earlier), nor would I have considered taking the extra time to provide instructor-led discussion videos. Ultimately, the topics I learned about in this course will help me in future instructor roles—I will take with me the charge to anticipate student struggles and needs (e.g., by considering issues students may face unique to each course), provide the resources students need to be successful (e.g., considering the course topic, in-person versus online modality), and take advantage of collaborating with other psychology educators (e.g., in sharing best practices).

Competency 2:
Creating Effective and Inclusive Learning Environments

  • Educators cannot simply serve as disseminators of content. To be maximally effective, educators must not only be knowledgeable about the course topic and deliver course content, but also provide a space for students to thrive. This often means educators need to consider how students might best learn a specific lesson, provide students with a wide variety of learning mechanisms (e.g., expanding beyond reading from lecture slides and incorporating other avenues for learning), and cultivate a classroom environment where students feel they can ask questions, share their insights, and be supported in their learning.

  • To learn about how educators can create effective and inclusive learning environments, I attended a workshop led by Dr. Kristin Parkin at the MSU Certification in College Teaching Institute in May 2025 (see agenda here).

    In this workshop, we learned about skills/techniques to become a better educator, enhance our teaching and learning effectiveness, and create a positive learning environment. For example, to create an inclusive environment for students, educators can think of themselves as a coach while the students are their players. A teacher and their students are on the same team—a “me versus them” mentality is detrimental to the environment educators create and can stifle any sense of safety or inclusion. Relatedly, we also discussed the importance of being a normal, relatable human being; to not be afraid to let the students see you as someone they feel comfortable around, can trust, and thus do not feel the need to “put on airs” to impress you. Show your personality, and let them show theirs! Create an environment that allows students to feel safe at whatever stage of learning they are in, where they can feel comfortable approaching you for help if needed. In my own teaching, I have aimed to help students feel comfortable in the classroom by sharing about my own life and experiences, offering flexible office hours, and providing encouragement and an enthusiastic response when students contributed to class discussions.

    We also learned that creating an effective and inclusive environment can be achieved through very practical means; for example, being clear about expectations in the course. Though it seems simple, providing clear expectations to students is effective for both the students and teacher, as everyone understands what is required and this minimizes potential back-and-forth to clarify. It also levels the playing field for students, as they are all receiving the same clear instruction, mitigating any potential confusion for some students on what is required. As such, in my own teaching, I have aimed to be explicit and clear in instructions to facilitate the establishment of an effective classroom environment (see my personality psychology syllabus here).

  • Providing students with a safe, inclusive, and effective learning environment is of key importance. Without this, any efforts to teach students and promote their engagement in the classroom will be met with great difficulty. This may be particularly true at the college level, and particularly in earlier college years, as students adapt to major life changes and shape their identities in the unknown, complex, and overwhelming new landscape that is college. In participating in the CCT workshop on creating effective and inclusive learning environments, I learned not only tips for fostering a positive learning environment, but also about my own convictions as an educator. It is immensely important to me to be able to ensure each student has the tools they need to be successful in the classroom, which comes both through my own effective communication as an educator and also by establishing a safe environment for students to make mistakes and learn. Showing students that the classroom is a low-stress, positive environment can help foster this effective learning environment, and can be communicated to students in a number of ways. For example, in my future teaching roles, I can take very simple steps, like playing music from a collaborative classroom playlist as students walk into class, or opening lecture that day with a funny meme, to help promote this safe environment. On a very practical level, I will provide students with clear expectations for coursework and assignments, as these clear expectations can also contribute to a sense of safety and confidence in the classroom.

Competency 3:
Incorporating Technology into Your Teaching

  • In our modern era, technology is rapidly progressing in all areas of life, including at our schools and universities. Though keeping up with the latest technology trend can feel overwhelming, it is important for educators to remain open-minded about incorporating technology into their classrooms when it can maximize student learning outcomes. For instance, simply incorporating interactive polls into a lecture may help maintain student engagement and reinforce learning objectives. Consideration must also be made regarding technology use not only in traditional in-person classroom settings, but also in online courses which largely depend on use of recent technological advancements. And of course, educators must still consider individual differences in student familiarity with, use of, and access to various educational technologies (in line with Competency 2, creating an effective and inclusive environment). Educators must be mindful to incorporate technology into their classrooms in an equitable way, ensuring all students have equal access to and opportunity to engage with material provided.

  • To learn about how educators can incorporate technology into teaching, I attended a workshop led by Dr. Stefanie Baier at the MSU Certification in College Teaching Institute in May 2025 (see agenda here).

    In this workshop, we learned about different technologies that can be incorporated into the classroom (e.g., audio/video materials, shared documents such as through Google Docs, social media) and brainstormed various ways these technologies could be leveraged to maximize student engagement. We also discussed the importance of ensuring any incorporation of technology serves to facilitate learning objectives and how we can use learning frameworks, such as Bloom’s Taxonomy, to critically assess the efficacy of technology use for achieving a learning objective. Related to considering individual differences among students technology use and resources, we also discussed how incorporating technology does not have to mean we use the latest-and-greatest new product. Very simple and accessible tools, such as online polls or iClickers, or even non-electronic visual/physical objects, can serve as technology use in the classroom. In my own teaching, one example of incorporating technology was in providing students with both text-based discussion materials and accompanying instructor-led videos (provided on OSF: https://osf.io/n8gjt).

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  • Providing students with a safe, inclusive, and effective learning environment is of key importance. Without this, any efforts to teach students and promote their engagement in the classroom will be met with great difficulty. This may be particularly true at the college level, and particularly in earlier college years, as students adapt to major life changes and shape their identities in the unknown, complex, and overwhelming new landscape that is college. In participating in the CCT workshop on creating effective and inclusive learning environments, I learned not only tips for fostering a positive learning environment, but also about my own convictions as an educator. It is immensely important to me to be able to ensure each student has the tools they need to be successful in the classroom, which comes both through my own effective communication as an educator and also by establishing a safe environment for students to make mistakes and learn. Showing students that the classroom is a low-stress, positive environment can help foster this effective learning environment, and can be communicated to students in a number of ways. For example, in my future teaching roles, I can take very simple steps, like playing music from a collaborative classroom playlist as students walk into class, or opening lecture that day with a funny meme, to help promote this safe environment. On a very practical level, I will provide students with clear expectations for coursework and assignments, as these clear expectations can also contribute to a sense of safety and confidence in the classroom.

Competency 4:
Understanding the University Context

  • Even within higher education, teaching can look very different across types of institutions. For example, teaching at a liberal arts college may share many similarities, but also important differences, with teaching at a research university. Teaching load expectations may be different, research and service expectations may be different, and the needs of the student body will be different. It is necessary for educators to understand how the university/college context plays a role not only in expectations of faculty, but also in student learning. Specific to teaching, an educator who understands these issues will adapt their approach to the classroom as needed to cater to the student population they are serving.

  • To learn about the importance of understanding the university context, I attended a workshop led by Dr. Judith Stoddart at the MSU Certification in College Teaching Institute in May 2025 (see agenda here).

    In this workshop, we learned about the various types of higher education institutions in the United States (e.g., research university, liberal arts college, community college) and the different expectations each tends to have of faculty. We also discussed the university context as it relates to student learning—how the social climate, political climate, etc. impacts the university climate and ultimately student learning. In this session, we also learned about crafting teaching statements and the importance of understanding a specific university’s context, mission, vision, and values when considering your teaching philosophy and how it will relate to and serve the students of that particular institution. My teaching statement can be found here.

  • Teaching undergraduates at a community college can be immensely different from teaching graduate students at a research university. Understanding the context of the educational institution on student expectations and learning is of key importance for instructors who seek to provide a maximally effective course. For instance, providing an effective course in psychology for community college students taking the course as a pre-requisite may look different than providing the same course for psychology majors at a research university. In the former, when teaching non-major students, a teacher may focus on real-world applications of psychology, provide students with engaging videos to aid in learning, and connect psychological concepts back to the students’ lives. In the latter, when teaching psychology majors, a teacher may focus on incorporating recent research papers into the course, helping students make connections between subfields of psychology to foster inter-field collaboration, and introducing students to study designs and statistical methods. Understanding the university and the student body is necessary so educators can provide maximally relevant and useful content to the students they are teaching.

    Participating in the CCT workshop was particularly useful, as I had not given much thought before to the nuanced differences in teaching across different university contexts. From this workshop, I recognized that to be a maximally effective educator, I need to carefully consider the institution I am in and the students I serve. In future teaching opportunities, I will craft learning objectives, assignments, and lessons for the students and the institution I am in, also considering the impact of the social and political climate outside of the university.

Competency 5:
Assessing Student Learning

  • Assessing student learning goes beyond simply giving a grade. For example, educators must understand the importance of establishing learning objectives, work to create assignments and activities that facilitate reaching those learning objectives, and develop ways to assess student progress that aligns with the learning objectives. It is also important to provide various ways for students to intake course content (e.g., written materials as well as audio/visual materials) and to consider varying methods for assessing learning (for example, not just multiple-choice exam questions, but perhaps also opportunities to write, create, or work in groups).

  • To learn further about assessing student learning, I attended a workshop led by Dr. Rique Campa at the MSU Certification in College Teaching Institute in May 2025 (see agenda here).

    In this workshop, we learned about the importance of establishing well thought-out learning objectives and working to ensure all course activities support students in reaching those learning objectives. We learned about Bloom’s taxonomy and how we can leverage paradigms such as this to identify (for ourselves and our students) what it is we want students to be able to achieve with each learning outcome (e.g., remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, or create). We also discussed our own mentored teaching projects, in which we were required to identify a teaching/learning goal and research question, design a study to test the question, analyze data and draft results, and ultimately draw a conclusion. My mentored teaching project is described in detail in the next section.

  • See “Reflection” under Mentored Teaching Project drop-down below.

mentored teaching project

  • Many online summer courses in the psychology department are taught by graduate students, but the lectures are often pre-recorded by former students and/or faculty. Thus, in many summer online asynchronous courses, the students do not see nor hear their actual instructor. This may reduce student engagement and be detrimental to student course outcomes. Thus, I sought to determine whether visual and audio representation of the instructor in an online course setting may improve student engagement and learning outcomes. I investigated this using various modes of content dissemination (text, video), as well as various methods to assess student learning, such as written discussion post responses, video-watching behavior, and multiple-choice questions.

    I tested this question through two studies (MSU IRB # 12-267):

    1) PSY 236 asynchronous online course offered Summer 2025 (for which I was the instructor): Do students in PSY 236 who watch brief videos of the instructor have better learning outcomes and improved engagement than those who don’t?

    2) Undergraduate student research pool (SONA): Do participants assigned to watch the videos (compared to those who read a transcript of the video content) report higher engagement and obtain better scores on a content quiz?

    In brief, in Study 1 (N = 30), students who watched instructor-led course content videos thought the videos improved their engagement in the course and connection to the instructor. Further, watching the videos was positively associated with student engagement (e.g., number of visits to and time spent in online classroom). Study 2 (N = 600) was a randomized experiment in which I tested whether participants who watched the videos reported higher engagement, understanding, and comprehension compared to participants who read equivalent text. Contrary to expectations, those who read the text performed better than those who watched the videos, though applications to classroom contexts may be limited. Overall, this series of studies provides a first step in assessing the utility of visual and audio instructor representation in facilitating positive learning outcomes for students in online classrooms.

  • The required 6-step outline document can be found here.

  • All materials I created for use in this project are publicly available on OSF: https://osf.io/n8gjt. This includes assessment instruments (e.g., survey measures), text/video scripts, and the instructor-led videos themselves. De-identified data and analyses code are also included.

  • In Study 1 (N = 30), I found that students reported that watching instructor-led videos providing course content helped them feel more engaged with the course and connected to the instructor. Student interaction with the instructor-led videos was also positively associated with course engagement behaviors, such as number of visits to and time spent in the online classroom. As such, this study provides a first step in assessing the usefulness of visual and audio instructor representation for facilitating positive learning outcomes for students in online classrooms. Future work is needed to replicate these findings in larger classroom settings and across different classroom contexts.

    Interestingly, the experimental study (Study 2; N = 600) did not support this finding. Instead, participants in the text group showed higher comprehension and self-reported engagement than participants in the video group. Ultimately, we must consider that assessing learning in the context of a brief online experiment is vastly different from assessing learning outcomes in the classroom. Researchers must often take a logical leap from their experimental manipulation to the phenomena of interest in the real world—that is, they seek to attain construct validity in their experimental measures and manipulations. In the present case, I anticipated that the experimental paradigm represented the experience of students in a classroom appropriately, or at least well enough. However, this may not have been an accurate assumption. The experiment clearly tests whether seeing and hearing a speaker present information is beneficial to engaging with and understanding material, or if reading the same information is superior. However, it is unclear what inferences can be drawn pertaining to the classroom. I hypothesized that learning outcomes would be higher among participants who watched the videos compared to those who read the text scripts because of the incremental value of instructor visibility. However, in the experimental study, this is not necessarily a question of instructor visibility, but speaker visibility. It is likely that participants in the brief experimental study did not have the same expectations of the researcher to be present, engaged, and involved that students in a class would have of their instructor. If this were true, there would be no reason to anticipate that participants who watched the video would have better learning outcomes than those who read the text.

  • I learned many notable lessons from this project. First, I learned how tricky it is to collect data in a classroom setting. One, simply because enrollment necessarily constrains sample size. Though there wasn’t anything I could do about the very small sample, it did severely limit the conclusions I could confidently draw from Study 1. Two, because you cannot randomly assign conditions in a classroom in a way that does not potentially compromise learning equity. Of course this restricts the ability to make causal inferences, but it also makes it difficult to ensure that there is enough variability in the outcome to be able to assess any relationships. If I were to do this project again, I might adjust my approach and make the videos required watching. But rather than focus on the outcome of whether students watched/didn’t watch videos, I’d operationalize the outcome as how much students watched the videos (for example, watch rate).

    I also learned that one must be very thoughtful about translating classroom research into a context-independent experimental setting. I thought adding the experimental study was going to be a great supplement to the classroom study. However, I now wonder whether an experimental setting is just too far from the classroom setting (at least for this question) to be useful. If I were to do this again, I would give additional thought to how I might adjust the experiment to be more ecologically valid. Or, even better, I would focus my efforts on finding a way to replicate the first study in a larger classroom.

    Though the first study had a very small sample size, thus inferences need to be taken with caution, I will still purpose to provide some form of clear indication to my students that I am involved and engaged in the online course, as I think this communicates that I am invested in their learning. This may be through video representation as in Study 1, or this may be through other forms such as holding virtual office hours or study sessions. That is to say, the findings from this study would not dissuade me from continuing to provide a means of visual/audio instructor representation to my online course students. Rather, I think the study provides preliminary evidence that instructor-led videos are beneficial to student learning outcomes, and thus I would continue to provide this for my students (and continue to test it).

  • You can find a manuscript of this project written specifically for the certificate program here.

    A publication-focused manuscript for this project is currently under review with Psychology Learning and Teaching.

  • My teaching project mentor was Dr. William Chopik. His evaluation of this project and my performance in designing and implementing it can be found here.