CTL's Graduate Fellowship for Teaching Excellence program honors graduate students who are dedicated to excellent teaching and is designed to foster conversations about teaching to help graduate students develop as teachers. Graduate Fellows facilitate teaching workshops in their departments and across the university, observe graduate students teaching and offer feedback, and meet regularly as a fellows group to discuss teaching practices.
Candidates for this fellowship must be nominated by their department; the call for nominations goes out to graduate chairs in the spring semester. For more information about the Graduate Fellows Program contact Ian Petrie.
Current Graduate Fellows for Teaching Excellence
Biology
Addison (he/him) is a fourth year PhD candidate in the department of Biology in the School of Arts and Sciences. His research focuses on the transcriptomic basis of interactions between plants and mutualistic bacteria when the host plant is also colonized by pathogenic nematodes. Before coming to Penn, Addison taught high school biology for several years. During this time he received his M.Ed and was a part time administrator for an interdisciplinary, project-based learning academic program at the school where he taught. Prior to teaching high school, Addison was an outdoor educator and tropical field ecology research intern. At Penn, he has served as instructor, teaching assistant, tutor, and grader for various biology courses and organizes the annual High School Science Day put on by the Department of Biology.
Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics
Greg is a fifth year PhD student in the department of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics (MEAM). He is studying soft pneumatic actuation for applications in robotics and is advised by Dr. Mark Yim and Dr. James Pikul. Greg has served as a TA for undergraduate dynamics (MEAM211) and graduate mechatronic design (MEAM510). He aims to develop and employ teaching practices that promote classroom community, contextualized transfer of knowledge, and student-centered learning. Prior to his PhD, Greg completed his BS in ME at Villanova University and his MS in ME at Stanford University. He was previously employed as a forensic engineer at Exponent consulting.
Italian Studies
Lourdes Contreras is a fourth year Ph.D. candidate in the Francophone, Italian, and Germanic Studies department. Her academic interests encompass the themes of exile and ecological representations in women-written Italian literature. Her interest in displacement and rootedness stem from the presence of the root metaphor in Italian literature from the fifteenth century to the contemporary period and the implications that this metaphor has on broader political and theoretical issues. She is interested in creating interdisciplinary models of language pedagogy in language classrooms and building equitable and inclusive lessons and syllabi in both content and language courses. She has contributed to the The Pedagogical Repository of Italian Media Activities (PRIMA), an open education resource for Italian teachers and students that provides authentic artistic content and diversifies representation in language materials. Lourdes has also presented at the American Association of Teachers of Italian on the inclusion of Ecocriticism and eco-conscious content in Italian literature courses. Lourdes grew up in Chicago and completed her BA in Italian and political science at DePaul University.
Earth & Environmental Sciences
Jaydee is a 4th year PhD candidate from the department of Earth and Environmental Science in the School of Arts and Sciences (SAS). Her research focuses on a sub-category of microplastics known as tire- and road-wear particles. Currently, she studies these particles in road dust from the streets of Philadelphia and will follow the transport of the particles via stormwater runoff into the Schuylkill River. She is deeply committed to research that studies anthropogenic pollution through geochemistry and mineralogy. Through her department, she has been a TA for classes like Intro to Environmental Science and Intro to Geology. She looks forward to engaging with graduate students across Penn and is particularly interested in creating engaging and safe atmospheres for students.
Social Policy & Practice
Ari S. Gzesh, MSW is pursuing a PhD in Social Welfare at UPenn’s School of Social Policy and Practice, and is a Fellow in Leadership Education and Adolescent Health at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. They are earning certificates in both Implementation Science and Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies, so as to promote integration between social sciences and humanities, particularly in the use of theory for conceptualizing research design. Gzesh has been awarded the Penn Marymount Fellowship, as well as funding through the Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics, and the Eidos LGBTQ+ Health Research Initiative. Prior to their doctoral studies, Gzesh engaged in direct practice with marginalized young people for over a decade, as both an educator and therapist. A Teach for America alumni, Gzesh spent eight years in traditional and alternative classrooms, spanning from secondary schools to San Quentin Prison to domestic violence shelters. After earning a Master of Social Work from Columbia University, they worked as a community-based clinician in the Bay Area of California, supporting system-involved youth experiencing sexual exploitation, substance use, and housing instability.
Gzesh is passionate about improving psychosocial and health outcomes for sexual/gender minority youth, by exploring how chosen families can provide corrective experiences for past attachment ruptures, embodied oppression, and complex trauma. Gzesh uses critical mixed methods to leverage cultural wealth embedded in queer communities for research-informed practice and practice-informed research.
Communication
Liz is a third-year doctoral student at the Annenberg School for Communication where she studies the intersection of collective memory and national identity as it plays out in (and is enabled by) the news media. She is especially interested in the linkages between journalism and culture, and what these linkages mean for political subjectivity, the public sphere, and democracy globally. So far at Penn, Liz has had the opportunity to serve as a teaching fellow for required Communication survey courses, like Critical Approaches to Popular Culture, taught by Dr. Jessa Lingel, as well as elective courses like Critical Perspectives in Journalism Studies, taught by Dr. Barbie Zelizer. Liz earned her bachelor’s degree in International Studies and English Literature from Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota (where her love of teaching began with a stint as an undergraduate writing tutor!).
Neuroscience
Kyndall received her B.S. in Biochemistry with a minor in psychology from Hampton University in Hampton, VA. Kyndall is a former DI volleyball player, which sparked her interests in concussions and traumatic brain injury. As a Neuroscience PhD candidate in Dr. Kacy Cullen's lab, she is researching how diet influences post traumatic brain injury damage. Kyndall serves as the Ernest E. Just Biomedical Society President, a Center for Undergraduate & Research Fellowships (CURF) Graduate Fellow, Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) Fellow, and is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Gilliam Fellow. Kyndall works with The Franklin Institute to organize annual CRISPR workshops for high schoolers, mentors high school students internationally and nationally through Lumiere Education, and mentors undergraduate students on their projects in her lab. Kyndall was born and raised in central Maryland, so in her free time she loves to eat crabs, go to Ravens football games, and go on bike rides.
Bioengineering
Aoife is a 3rd year PhD candidate in the BE department advised by Dr. Arjun Raj. Her work focuses on quantifying cellular memory, with future applications in epigenetic immunoengineering. Aoife holds a bachelor's degree in Bioengineering: Biotechnology from the University of California, San Diego, where her work focused on the role of tumor draining lymphatics in responses to immune checkpoint blockade in HNSCC. While at Penn, Aoife has served as a teaching assistant for three bioengineering courses, and as a research mentor for two years with the Diversity Action Plan for Penn Genomics. She is particularly interested in decolonization, diversity, and inclusion in the engineering classroom, and looks forward to continuing to grow as an educator.
Computer & Information Science
Artemis is a third-year Computer Science Ph.D. student, focusing on the multimodality and interpretability of artificial intelligence models. Prior to this, she undertook the Dual Degree in Artificial Intelligence at Penn, majoring in Computer and Cognitive Science as well as Philosophy. Concurrently, she also obtained her Master's in Computer Science.
During her time at Penn, Artemis served as a Teaching Assistant for five different computer science courses. In 2019, she was awarded the Penn Engineering Exceptional Service Award for her teaching contributions.
She has also taught computer science at the Kohelet-Yeshiva Elementary School and South Woods State Prison, making computer science accessible to diverse communities.
Artemis aims to stimulate student interest in mathematics, logic, and computer science while overcoming any mental obstacles from past experiences. She is deeply committed to promoting a comprehensive, widespread literacy in the field of computer science.
https://artemisp.github.io/
Music
Susanna is a third year PhD Student in Music Composition. They research collaborative improvisation, mixing electronic and acoustic sounds, and using feedback cycles as a musical sound source. At Penn, they have served as instructor for the Music Theory and Musicianship Fundamentals course and they have taught introductory and intermediate levels of this course at other institutions. As a teacher, they are interested in active learning techniques, project-based learning, integrating theory with application, and creating a more accessible academia, especially for neurodiverse and queer members of the learning community. Susanna grew up here in Philadelphia and received a BA in Music from the New College of Florida as well as an MM in Music Composition from the University of Oregon. In their free time, they enjoy studying Muay Thai, reading speculative fiction, and sipping various teas.
Political Science
Miranda Sklaroff is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Political Science. Her dissertation is on anti-eugenics as a political lens for understanding twentieth-century feminist movements and public policy. She has been a TA for a diverse array of classes including Ancient Political Thought and The Public Policy Process. In her classes, Miranda is politically and pedagogically committed to the notion that all students are already political theorists, whether or not they know it, as they try to make sense of the world and the contours of power that shape their lives. When she’s not teaching, she’s running reading groups, painting, or playing with her dogs.
Religious Studies
Jeremy Steinberg is a fifth-year PhD candidate in the department of Religious Studies, studying the Hebrew Bible and Judaism in the ancient Greek and Roman world. His dissertation examines the ways that Greek-educated ancient Jewish writers reconceptualized the Bible in accordance with Greek and Roman notions about the nature and purpose of literature. Jeremy is teaching Gender, Sexuality & Religion in Fall 2023; previously, he has served as a TA for Religion & Sports; Gender, Sexuality & Religion; Jews & Judaism in Antiquity; and Religions of the West. Jeremy holds a BA in Religion from Haverford College and a post-baccalaureate certificate in Classical Languages from Penn.
Economics
Marcus is a fifth-year PhD student in Economics whose research is in applied microeconomic theory. After completing his undergraduate studies at UNSW Sydney, he first worked for an Australian investment bank before moving to Europe to take a derivatives trading role in Amsterdam. At Penn, Marcus has enjoyed teaching for game theory courses at both the graduate and undergraduate levels; he is passionate about delivering stimulating classes that leverage interactive experiences to engage students. He will serve as a CTL TA trainer for the 2023 TA cohort, and is excited to further develop his teaching through the CTL fellowship.
Chemistry
Taylor is a second year PhD student in the Department of Chemistry. Her research focuses on post-translational modifications of tau protein, involved in Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. Prior to Penn, Taylor earned a BS in Chemistry and a BA in Sociology from the University of Pittsburgh. At Penn, she has been a TA for General Chemistry courses and won a departmental teaching award. She also worked for CTL as a TA Trainer, designing and leading sections of the Grading in the Sciences and Quantitative Social Sciences workshop during CTL TA Training 2023. Taylor is passionate about the interdisciplinary nature of the sciences and the humanities and finding ways to connect people and topics in the classroom.
Current Graduate Fellows for Inclusive & Equitable Teaching
Biology
Skyler is a fifth-year PhD Candidate in the Biology department. Her research interests broadly include studying the mechanisms that drive rapid evolution, and she is currently working on probing how manipulating environmental conditions alters evolutionary trajectories in D. melanogaster populations. In addition to her research at Penn, Skyler has worked as a TA for the biology department, served as President of the Biology Graduate Group, and mentored undergraduate and high school students through both the PennFERBS and PennLENS programs. She is also passionate about public outreach and science communication, and she has worked at the Delaware Museum of Nature & Science as a public programming intern, as well as at the Franklin Institute through Penn’s Career Exploration Fellowship. As a fellow, she is looking forward to collaborating with her peers to design best teaching practices across disciplines, and she is especially interested in shaping the curriculum and culture in STEM courses to be more welcoming and inclusive.
Political Science
Yara is a PhD student in political theory and comparative politics researching humor in times of crisis. As a graduate student at Penn, she gained teaching experience as teaching assistant and as instructor of record. Yara’s dedication to education and student life goes beyond the classroom; she served as interim undergraduate student advisor at the political science department, and is currently a fourth year Graduate Resident Advisor at Harnwell College House. For her dedication to teaching, she received the Alvin Z. Rubinstein Award for Distinguished Teaching by a Political Science Graduate Student.
History
Jenny (she/her) is a fifth year Ph.D. candidate in the Department of History where her dissertation research combines legal, social, medical, and disability histories to explore how gender and disability were mutually constitutive in early America. At Penn she has been a TA for undergraduate classes on American economic history and multiple offerings in legal history and early American history, in addition to Penn’s broader U.S. history survey. Prior to graduate school, Jenny was a practicing lawyer in New York and London, including as an International Human Rights Clinic supervisor and associate at the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, NYU School of Law. Her experience in transnational and human rights law as well as disability history has made her particularly passionate about creating classroom spaces which emphasize belonging and amicable engagement with the diversity of lived experiences. A Penn undergraduate alumna (B.A. in History and Political Science), Jenny is also a strong advocate for humanities education within the University.
Mathematics
Maxine is a fourth-year PhD candidate, 2023 Dean's Scholar, and 2020 NSF Graduate Research Fellow in the mathematics department. Her research focuses on algebraic topology and homotopy theory. Hailing from a small beach town in San Diego, CA, she received a BA in mathematics from Reed College in Portland, OR, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. In the mathematics department at Penn, she co-organizes the Directed Reading Program, which pairs graduate students with undergraduates for independent studies, as well as GeMs in Math, the graduate and faculty group supporting gender minorities in mathematics. She has translated her passion for mathematical communication and outreach through her work as a 2023 AAAS Mass Media Fellow, a 2021 and 2022 fellow for the Netter Center's Penn Graduate Community-Engaged Research Mentorship program, and a volunteer instructor with Princeton's Prison Teaching Initiative.
Economics
Ornella is a fifth year PhD student in Economics. Her research focuses on education and demographic diversity. Her dissertation investigates bilingual and cultural-friendly programs for indigenous students in Mexico; furthermore, she has run several experiments concerning the impact of demographic diversity on group learning and teamwork. Before starting her PhD, she has worked as a consultant for the World Bank in the Balkans on a project training young entrepreneurs from the region and as a field coordinator for Bocconi University in Sierra Leone on a project on harmful social norms and girls' education.
Classical Studies
Tiffany is a fourth year PhD candidate in the Classical Studies department. Her research focuses on crucial moments of decision making in the works of Seneca the Younger. At Penn, she has taught multiple Latin courses and TA’d for Greek and Roman Mythology. Additionally, as a part of the Classics department’s Anti-Racism Working group, she was part of a committee to put on a year long workshop series, “First Fridays,” on topics of anti-racist theory, pedagogy, and the impact of white supremacy.
English
Nat is a fifth-year PhD Candidate in English at Penn. Their research interests include premodern poetry, trans studies, and the history of sexuality. They are working on a dissertation that examines gender, race, and classical reception history in late medieval and early modern England. For the AY 2022–24, they are a Graduate Associate for the Trans Oral History Project run by the Center for Research in Feminist, Queer, and Transgender Studies. Nat received a BA in English and Gender & Women's Studies from Pomona College.
Previous Graduate Fellows for Teaching Excellence
Stacey Bevan
Nursing
Thomas Brazelton
Mathematics
Deion Dresser
Italian Studies
Elizabeth Dunens
Higher Education
Jesse Hanlan
Physics & Astronomy
Paul He
Computer & Information Science
Bryce Heatherly
East Asian Languages & Civilizations
Tessa Huttenlocher
Sociology
Tyler Leigh
Communication
Chloe Ricks
Political Science
Jeremy Rubin
Biostatistics
Michael Shea
Comparative Literature
Jessica Weakly
Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics
Alexandra Zborovsky
History
Ada Aka
Psychology
Natalia Enid Aponte Borges
Earth & Environmental Science
Lauren Bridges
Communication
Alexis Crockett
Neuroscience
Abigail Dym
Political Science
Taylor Dysart
History & Sociology of Science
Marisa Egan
Cell and Molecular Biology
Sheng Gao
Statistics
Tony Liu
Computer and Information Science
Mercedes Mayna-Medrano
Hispanic Studies
Jane Robbins Mize
English
Paradorn (Joe) Rummaneethorn
Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Kimberly White
History
Angela Xia
Religious Studies
Matt DeCross
Physics and Astronomy
Mohammad Fereydounian
Electrical and Systems Engineering
Shivajee Govind
Chemistry
Lauren Harris
Sociology
Antoine Haywood
Communication
Davy Knittle
English
Kristina Lewis
Education
Zachary Loeb
History and Sociology of Science
Theodora Naqvi
Classical Studies
Bruno Saconi
Nursing
Adam Sax
Comparative Literature & Literary Theory
Zachary Smith
Political Science
Daniel Wilde
Management
Tamir Williams
History of Art
Sonia Bansal
Bioengineering
Emilie Benson
Physics
Irteza Binte-Farid
Education
Alexandra Brown
Romance Languages
Rui Castro
Architecture
Joseph Cooke
Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics
McFeely Jackson Goodman
Mathematics
Erynn Johnson
Earth & Environmental Science
Karren Knowlton
Management
Erica Lawrence
Biology
Alexis Rider
History & Sociology of Science
Anna Leigh Todd
History
Rachel Wise
History of Art
Naomi Zucker
Anthropology
Cameron Anglum
Education
Phoebe Askelson
Chemistry
Elizabeth Bynum
Music
Ava Creemers
Linguistics
Dana Cypress
English
Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach
Comparative Literature
Maryam Khojasteh
City and Regional Planning
Alex Miller
Operations, Information and Decisions
Samantha Oliver
Communication
Ryan Pilipow
Ancient History
Katerina Placek
Neuroscience
Brian Reese
Philosophy
Didem Uca
German
Shantee Rosado
Senior Graduate Fellow
Diego Arispe-Bazán
Anthropology
Chelsea Chamberlain
History
Welton Chang
Psychology
Danielle Hanley
Political Science
Kathryn Hasz
Mechanical Enginering & Applied Mechanics
Elaine LaFay
History & Sociology of Science
Mark Lewis
Education
Santiago Paternain
Electrical & Systems Engineering
Steven Renette
Art & Archaeology of the Mediterranean World
Maria Ryan
Music
Hao Jun (Howie) Tam
English
Noa Hegesh
East Asian Languages & Civilizations
Joseph Hoisington
Mathematics
Najnin Islam
English
Erika Kontulainen
German
Theo Lim
City & Regional Planning
Elena Maris
Communication
Paul Mitchell
Anthropology
Stan Najmr
Chemistry
Trishala Parthasarathi
Neuroscience
Rebecca Rivard
Cancer Biology, Perelman School of Medicine
Shantee Rosado
Sociology
Jane Sancinito
Ancient History
SaraEllen Strongman
Africana Studies
Helen Teng
Nursing
Osman Balkan
Political Science
Katie Clonan-Roy
Education
Mitra Eghbal
Biology
Naomi Fitter
Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics
Alison Howard
Comparative Literature
Jin Woo Jang
Mathematics
Dianne Mitchell
English
Jake Morton
Ancient History
Raha Rafii
Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations
Kyle Smith
Chemistry
Tim Sowicz
Nursing
Kelsey Speer
Cell & Molecular Biology, Perelman School of Medicine
Kristian Taketomo
History
Bronwyn Wallace
Senior Graduate Fellow
Justin Bernstein
Philosophy
Ben Chrisinger
City & Regional Planning
Peter Sachs Collopy
History and Sociology of Science
Lili Dworkin
Computer and Information Science
Ian M. Hartshorn
Political Science
Alice Hu
Classical Studies
Jacob Nagy
Chemistry
Emmabeth Parrish
Materials Science and Engineering
Tanya Singh
Biology
Colin Smith
Neuroscience
Phillip Webster
Religious Studies
Vanessa Williams
Music
Richard Eisenberg
Computer and Information Science
Lindsey Fiorelli
Philosophy
Jay Lucci
Classical Studies
Rose Muravchick
Religious Studies
Sal Nicolazzo
Comparative Literature
Rebecca Pierce
Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics
Irene Sibbing Plantholt
Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Bridget Swanson
German
Bronwyn Wallace
English
Tanya Weerakkody
Neuroscience
Eric Bellin
Architecture
Derek Blackwell
Communication
Carolyn Chernoff
Education and Sociology
Wiebke Deimling
Philosophy
Emily Gerstell
English
Bryan Jones
Romance Languages
JR Keller
Management
Matthew Kruer
History
Peter-Michael Osera
Computer and Information Science
Olivia Padovan-Merhar
Physics
Will Schmenner
History of Art
Max Topaz
Nursing
Madeleine Wilcox
East Asian Languages and Civilizations
Ursula Williams
Chemistry
Megan Potteiger
Senior Graduate Fellow
Claire Bourne
English
Rosella Cappella
Political Science
Meghan Crnic
History & Sociology of Science
Daniel DiMassa
German
Jen Gerrish
Classical Studies
Rachel Guberman
History
Beth Hallowell
Anthropology
Grace Lavery
Comparative Literature
Tara Liss-Marino
Communication
Emil Pitkin
Statistics
Melanie Adley
German
Adam Aviv
Computer & Information Science
Carolyn Brunelle
Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations
Andrew Crocco
Communication
Britt Dahlberg
Anthropology
Glenn Holtzman
Music
Catherine Kopil
Neuroscience
Shimul Melwani
Management
Megan Potteiger
Chemistry
Miranda Routh
History of Art
Charles Thomas
Physics
Bryan Cameron
Romance Languages
Barbara Elias
Political Science
Rosemary Frasso
Social Policy & Practice
Jessica Lautin
History
Nathaniel Prottas
History of Art
Amanda Reiterman
Art & Archaeology of the Mediterranean World
Nicole Ruedy
Operations & Information Management
Paul White
Mechanical Engineering
Megan Phifer-Rixey
Senior Graduate Fellow
Drew Hilton
Computer and Information Science
Greta LaFleur
English
Peter Mondelli
Music
Roberto Salguero-Gomez
Biology
Clayton Shonkwiler
Math
Nicole Myers Turner
History
Noah Drezner
Education
Daniela Fera
Chemistry
Sarah Manekin
History
Megan Phifer-Rixey
Biology
Angelina Stelmach
Romance Languages
Brandon Woods
English
Kate Baldanza
East Asian Languages and Civilizations
Andrew Knight
Management
Sarah Manekin
History
Melody Mark
Ancient History
Jennifer Pastore
Biology
Deniz Selman
Economics
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