Teaching portfolio
Dilia’s teaching philosophy (in her own words):
I enjoy teaching and the opportunity to engage and interact with students while developing their interest and understanding of a topic to a level of shared excitement. I consider teaching an important investment in the next generation, while it also helps me to be a better scientist, as students challenge me to think about the material differently. As such, a core aspect of my teaching philosophy is that I think that teaching and learning are a two-way street, and that I consider my students co-learners.
A second core aspect of my teaching philosophy is that I believe everyone is capable of learning and that it is important to understand different learning styles. I have noted that some of the most successful mentors are not necessarily those who attract students with the highest exam scores. A critical aspect of mentoring is giving students the opportunity to find out what they are good at and encouraging them to excel in that area. My goal is for students to become independent thinkers, learners, and problem-solvers.
A third core aspect of my teaching philosophy is the belief that teaching and learning are fun, and that they become more fun when both teacher and student can see the progress in learning. As a teacher, I try to generate excitement by giving students responsibility for their own projects and letting them work on challenging and interesting problems.
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SELECTED COURSES
| Environmental Field Methods
4 credits | Semester-long course
How do we know if something is “fake news” or “true news”? In environmental science, we need to know the difference between “real data” and “fake data”: in other words, how do we measure, what are the limitations of specific measurements, and to what extent can we extrapolate the measurement. Of course, this is important if you want to do research and understand processes, but also if you are, for example, an urban planner or a modeler using data collected by someone else.
Learn how commonly used environmental parameters such as wind, temperature, humidity and soil moisture are measured, and what the numbers mean: we will also explore the complexity of these parameters in the urban environment. Learn to program a datalogger. Learn to connect, test, and set up sensors for long-term and short-term measurements of microclimate and soil conditions.
Course subjects:
- Sensor measurement principles, program and connect the datalogger, test sensors
- Setting up a weather station and soil sensors
- Data collection and troubleshooting, long-term vs instantaneous soil measurements
- System take-down and data analysis, long-term vs instantaneous weather measurements
| Introduction to Soil, Plant & Atmosphere Interactions
2 credits | Semester-long course
Vegetation is an essential component of ecosystems. The goal of this course is to gain an understanding of the complex processes that govern interactions between plants and their physical environment (soil and atmosphere). We will break down the physics of water transport from the soil, through plant roots and leaves, into the atmosphere, and examine what happens under stressed conditions. We will use simplified calculations to quantify potential and actual plant transpiration. We will also discuss how remotely sensed surface temperatures are used to quantify transpiration.
Course subjects:
- Plants and plant communities
- Light interception by plant canopies
- Soil-plant-atmosphere continuum
- Potential transpiration
- Actual transpiration
- Plant available water
- Plant stress and water use efficiency
- Remotely sensed transpiration
| Ecohydrology
2 credits | Semester-long course
Ecohydrology is the interface between ecology and hydrology, incorporating a multidisciplinary approach to ecosystems. Learn about interactions and feedback mechanisms between climate, hydrology, and vegetation patterns in different environments (e.g. arid vs temperate, urban vs natural vs agricultural. Learn about the physical processes and the potential effects of climate change. Each topic will include background and a discussion of current views, supported by literature. The emphasis will be on discussing and debating current issues.
Course subjects:
- Soil water
- Plant water & energy
- Evapotranspiration
- Water resource management
- Vegetation competition
- Drought & desertification
- Urban environments
| Introduction to Environmental Sciences
4 credits | Semester-long course
The course deals with the relationship between the physical environment (air, water, land) and organisms (plants, animals, and human beings), and their impact on space, depending on temporal components under natural and non-natural processes (processes directly or indirectly related to human activity). The main sciences that will be highlighted in the course are Biogeography (Phytogeography and Zoogeography) and Ecology
