Teaching and Mentorship
At the center of my teaching philosophy, I want to inspire my students to be critical thinkers who can analyze information from different perspectives and are sensitive to diversity issues. During my graduate school experience at the University of Michigan, I have been fortunate to receive formal teaching training as a Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) in undergraduate courses. I have also given workshops and have been a research mentor for students (including undergraduate and master-level students) for many years.
This combination of formal and informal teaching experiences has shaped me to develop a step-by-step approach to teaching: 1) building a positive learning environment as the foundation; 2) inspiring students to critically think about course materials and cultivating sensitivity to diversity issues; and 3) understanding individual differences in learning abilities and styles to develop specialized strategies that can be tailored to individual outcomes. At a minimum, I feel that my job as a teacher is to empower students to apply what they have learned to their future personal and professional development. After all, how good is my teaching if the transmission of knowledge stops at the end of the semester?
Experiences
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Graduate Student Instructor (GSI)
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During my graduate school experience at the University of Michigan, I have been fortunate to receive formal teaching training as a instructor in undergraduate courses including Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, Introduction to Developmental Psychology, Introduction to Psychopathology and Introduction to Psychology.
I have also designed and taught my own undergraduate course on Multicultural Perspectives on Child Development that focuses on understanding typical and atypical child development from a culturally diverse perspective. Check out the syllabus to find out more!
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Mentor for Undergraduate Honors Thesis and Research
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I feel one of the most rewarding moments is when students are able to co-generate and execute a research question. To facilitate this process, I have been involved in nearly every aspect of their involvement in our research lab – designing studies, training, coding, collecting and analyzing data, presenting in conferences, writing honors theses and manuscripts, and applying to graduate and medical schools. Recently, I also started working with a master’s level student on an internal grant application.
Students under my mentorship (or co-mentorship) have won Fulbright Fellowships and poster awards, published their research in renowned journals (e.g., Gach*, Ip, Sameroff & Olson, 2018, Journal of Family Psychology; Ip, McCroban* et al., in prep), and gone on to graduate and professional (i.e., law and medicine) schools.
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Mentor for Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP)
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I have been an active UROP mentor throughout my graduate school. UROP consists of 1st and 2nd year undergraduate students who often have no prior research experience. One of my goals through UROP is to spark research interest for incoming students and to equip them with skills (literature review, survey design and interview skills etc.) that they could apply to their future career.
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Through the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP), I have worked with many undergraduate students from diverse backgrounds (e.g., students of color, first-generation and international students, and students with financial needs). I believe that equipping them with strong research skills can enhance their self-esteem and motivate them to pursue academic and career paths that they might have never thought possible.
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Organizer and Mentor for Student Tackling Advanced Research (STAR) Program
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To increase diversity in research, I have been involved in designing and implementing a program called “Students Tackling Advanced Research (STAR) Scholars Program” specifically targets for first-generation, ethnic minority and under-represented students who may not have the opportunity for research. This program provides biweekly workshops (e.g., “Finding your Research Soulmate”, “Transferable Skills”, “PhD/Career Option” and “PhD Timeline and Application Process”) and individual mentorship to help under-represented students to develop an interest in research, provide them with resources for finding research labs, prepare them for graduate school applications and transfer their research skills to real-world settings.
My colleagues (including faculty and other graduate students) and I are now trying to expand this program to include more mentees and graduate mentors this year.
Call
T: 310 - 918 - 3813
Contact
Office location:
Department of Psychology
Yale University
New Haven, CT, 06511
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