Teaching Interests
My primary teaching interests include: website design and development, programming, database design, business intelligence, information security, and systems analysis and design. However, my teaching interests are not necessarily bound to particular topics. I am willing to prepare and teach a variety of IS courses.
Teaching Honors and Awards
- In Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Spring 2017, and Fall 2018, I received recognition from the Provosts office that my teaching evaluations were in the top 10% of evaluations across campus at Michigan Tech
- In Spring 2018, was named a finalist for the Distinguished Teaching Award at Michigan Tech, the university-wide teaching award designed to recognize a professor for exceptional teaching efforts
- In Spring 2017, I was inducted into the Academy of Teaching Excellence at Michigan Tech to recognize exceptional teaching efforts
- In Spring 2017, I was named a finalist for the Distinguished Teaching Award at Michigan Tech, the university-wide teaching award designed to recognize a professor for exceptional teaching efforts
- In Spring 2016, I received the SBE Teaching Award at Michigan Tech, a student nominated award to recognize a professor for exceptional teaching efforts
- In Spring 2016, I received the Props for Profs at Michigan Tech, a student nominated award to recognize professors for exceptional teaching efforts
- In Spring 2016, I nominated for the Outstanding Faculty Award by the Order of Omega Greek Life Honor Society, a student nominated award.
- In Spring 2015, I received an Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award from the Graduate School at UNCG for excellent teaching in my undergraduate and graduate courses.
- In Spring 2012, I received a Teaching in Excellence Award from the National Society of Leadership and Success (Sigma Alpha Pi) at UNCG.
Courses Taught
IS Management and Data Analysis (BA 5200): While at MTU, I taught the graduate IS management and data analysis course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course is a core course in the MBA and Master's of Data Science programs. The course covers the strategic and operational use of information technology and data. In the course, students work with a company to analyze data for the company or assist with an IT project.
- Fall 2017 (46 students)
- Fall 2016 (38 students)
Systems Design for Entrepreneurs (MIS 4990): While at MTU, I developed and am currently piloting a multi-semester program to provide support for CS and MIS students who desire to start their own business. The course will be offered as a 1 credit hour course each semester over the course of 3-6 semesters, depending on the needs of the students. Students will analyze customers needs, develop a solution as a minimum viable product, test the value of the product, and continue to refine the product.
- Fall 2018 (in session)
Business Intelligence (MIS 3400): While at MTU, I taught the undergraduate business intelligence course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course is offered to students in the MIS and business analytics majors and as an elective to students in the Master's of Data Science program. The course covers the design of data warehouses, such as the star schema, and their use. Students work on a dataset of 10 million records provided by an alumnus' company to analyze the data. The data analysis includes descriptive statistics, visualizations in Tableau, and time series analysis for the graduate students
- Spring 2018 (17 students)
Systems Analysis and Design (MIS 3200): While at MTU, I taught the undergraduate systems analysis and design course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course provides an overview of analysis and modeling techniques (both for use cases and user stories), describes different development methodologies such as Waterfall development, Scrum, extreme programming, and the Lean Startup. Students also learn to develop design models, UI prototypes, and programming architectures (API design; MVC, MVP, and MVVM frameworks; the Clean Architecture). In teams, students work to analyze and prototype a system for an organization or target market.
- Fall 2018 (in session)
- Fall 2017 (15 students)
- Fall 2016 (15 students)
Business Database Management (MIS 3100): While at MTU, I taught the business database management course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course covers conceptual, logical, and physical design of databases. Although NoSQL databases are discussed, the course primarily focuses on relational databases using MySQL to explore database queries. Student teams build a database for an organization based on the organization's specifications.
- Spring 2018 (28 students)
- Spring 2016 (24 students)
Business Process Analysis (MIS 3000): While at MTU, I taught the undergraduate process/systems analysis course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course offers an overview of business process analysis and systems analysis models and techniques, such as the lean model and UML modeling. I provided students with hands-on activities to practice using the different models. A student team also identified a local non-profit and analyzed the organizations information systems. They provided suggests for improvement of the organizations information recording and reporting efforts. They also instituted accounting software for the organization.
- Fall 2018 (in session)
- Spring 2017 (13 students)
- Fall 2015 (6 students)
IS/IT Management (MIS 2000): While at MTU, I taught the undergraduate introduction to IS course offered by the School of Business and Economics. The course offers an overview of IS topics (technical and managerial). I provided students with hands-on activities to work with the IS topics and technologies we discuss. Teams of students also identify an emerging technology and research its impact on business or interview IS/non-IS working professionals to compare and contrast different perspectives of IS in the workplace.
- Spring 2017 (39 students)
- Spring 2016 (32 students)
- Fall 2015 (~25 students)
Telecommunications and Distributed Networks (ISM 673): While at UNCG, I taught the online graduate networking course offered by the IS department. The course offers an overview of computer networking topics (technical and managerial). I provided students with hands-on opportunities to work with networking technologies to diagnose network issues. Teams of students also identified and engaged with a community partner on a network-related project.
- Spring 2015 (~30 students)
Secure Networked Systems (ISM 324): While at UNCG, I taught the undergraduate information security course offered by the IS department after the course was merged with the telecommunications and networking course. The course offers an overview of computer security topics (technical and operational security and risk management) and prepares students to take the CompTIA Security+ exam. Although the class was traditionally lecture-based, I also provided students with hands-on opportunities to conduct vulnerability scans and penetration tests of a simple network and website. Students were asked to devise hypothetical remedies to the vulnerabilities in the network and website. Teams of students also identified and engaged with a community partner on a security-related project. Some of the projects include conducting simple vulnerability assessments and developing or refining a business continuity plan.
- Spring 2015 (~60 students)
Business Processes and Information Technology (ISM 280): While at UNCG, I taught the undergraduate business processes course offered by the IS department. The course introduces major business functions, organizational structures, and business processes. The course focuses on how technology can improve business processes and enhance organizational strategy and performance.
- Fall 2014 (~60 students)
Programming 1 (ISM 240): While at UNCG, I taught the undergraduate programming course offered by the IS department. The course offers an introduction to object-oriented programming and other programming topics (e.g., variables, arrays, conditionals, loops, etc.). The course is hands on. Students learn to program by using Visual Basic in Visual Studio. In teams, students developed a prototype event management system for a community partner.
- Fall 2014 (~35 students)
Information Systems Security (ISM 324): While at UNCG, I taught the undergraduate information security course offered by the IS department. The course offers an overview of computer security topics (technical and operational security and risk management) and prepares students to take the CompTIA Security+ exam. Although the class was traditionally lecture-based, I also provided students with hands-on opportunities to conduct vulnerability scans and penetration tests of a simple network and website. Students were asked to devise hypothetical remedies to the vulnerabilities in the network and website. Teams of students also identified and engaged with a community partner on a security-related project. Some of the projects include conducting simple vulnerability assessments and developing or refining a business continuity plan. Qualitative student evaluations are available upon request.
- Spring 2014 (63 students)
Website Design and Development (ISM 116): While at UNCG, I taught an undergraduate website design and development course. The students learned to develop personal and business websites using HTML and CSS. I also introduced image editing, HTML5, javascript, and web programming with PHP. Although I primarily focused on teaching HTML and CSS code, I also provided an introduction to several web development tools, including: Dreamweaver, HTML Kit, Komodo Edit, Kompozer, Photoshop, GIMP, and Adobe Kuler. I also taught students visual design principles. Students developed two large projects—one individual project and one team project. I used community partners for team projects to provide students with real-world design experience. Teams consisting of 2-3 students competed with 3-5 other teams to provide a website for one of several community partners. Qualitative student evaluations are available upon request.
- Fall 2013 (56 students)
- Spring 2013 (35 students)
- Fall 2012 (60 students)
- Spring 2012 (60 students)
Quantitative Decision Analysis: While at BYU, I was a teaching assistant for a course on quantitative decision analysis. The course instructor (Donald Adolphson) taught lectures and I taught the hands-on lab sessions each week. Using advanced formulas in Excel, I taught students to apply the concepts they learned in lecture. The decision analysis method used in the course was a variation of Thomas Saaty's analytical hierarchy process. I taught the course labs for 2 semesters to students in the regular and executive MPA programs. No student rating data is available.
Teaching Philosophy
My goals in teaching are to help students develop fundamental IS skills, prepare students to contribute to knowledge generation in their future organizations, and promote learning and collaboration in team settings. My teaching philosophy is rooted in the idea that students must learn to assimilate knowledge through personal experience and critical thinking, and through collaboration with peers. This learning/teaching style simulates the process of learning that takes place in organizational contexts. For this reason, I believe in experiential and social learning. I see my roles in the classroom as that of a mentor and facilitator. As a mentor, my role is to direct student learning through lectures and hands-on activities. Through lecture, I provide students with a working vocabulary and theoretical understanding of a topic area. I then engage students in self-directed, hands-on activities to help them develop skills, think critically, and apply knowledge related to the particular topic area. I promote reflection of classroom experiences to facilitate further learning. As a facilitator, I promote group collaboration and advise students to seek assistance when they are unable to proceed with a learning exercise. I engage students with community partners, IS professionals, and real-world projects to expand their knowledge base and further hone their skills. Some of my students who have produced high quality work for community partners have been asked to continue with projects as paid consultants or interns.