Congratulations to Amanda Sain: selected as a member of Academy for Graduate Teaching Assistant Excellence
Amanda Sain, a Ph.D. candidate of Environmental and Water Resources (EWR) in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department and the Water INTERface program at Virginia Tech, has been recently selected by Dr. Karen DePauw (Dean of the VT Graduate School) to be a member of the newly formed Academy for Graduate Teaching Assistant Excellence. The Academy is to enhance the knowledge and skills in teaching for graduate students through training in innovative teaching and learning strategies, and to recognize excellence in teaching by graduate students. In Dean DePauw’s words, Amanda was being recognized for “your (her) strong commitment to excellent in teaching and creating affirming learning opportunities in higher education”.
Amanda has served as a teaching assistant to the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering since her first year of master study (2011). She has been a teaching assistant for 7 courses (4 undergraduate-level and 3 graduate-level)* and receiving strong reviews from her students. “She was very interactive during lessons and always willing to help and answer any questions. She does a thorough job in explaining all concepts”. “She provided key points with enough detail and background to understand what we were talking about. She challenged students to think and make connections with present situations through questions”. “She had little evaluations that force students to remember the material creating a good habit of learning and repetition”. As a primary instructor, Amanda has developed her own teaching style in course– Introduction to Environment Engineering (CEE 3104). At the beginning of each class, she gave a 5-mintute talk about the current events and ongoing research, such as recent chemical spills, air pollution problems, and research areas of other faculty in CEE. “She showed facts and examples of the material that are currently happening around the world”. “She is one of my best teachers so far at Tech. I like how she makes connections and is able to show/explain them”.
In the future, Amanda will continue her passion on teaching and extend her interests in the education of younger generation (elementary and middle school students). In addition, as a member of Water INTERface, she will also carry on her researches on the interaction between water and air quality, and influence of such interaction on public health1.
*Courses Amanda has taught in Virginia Tech:
CEE 5724 – Env. Monitoring and Sampling
CEE 4114 – Fundamentals of Public Health Engineering
CEE 3804 – Computer Applications for CEE
CEE 3104 – Introduction to Env. Engineering (Primary Instructor)
CEE 3104 – Introduction to Env. Engineering
CEE 5104 – Environmental Chemistry
CEE 5134 –Engineering Aspects of Water Quality
Other Teaching Experience of Amanda:
Water 4 Kids captain
CEED STEP, C-Tech^2 and Imagination Activity
Water Treatment Operator Short Course Instructor
Annual Good Laboratory Practices Conference & Workshops Instructor
Mentored NSF-REU Students
1Sain A E, Dietrich A M. Emission of Inhalable Dissolved Drinking Water Constituents by Ultrasonic Humidifiers. Environmental Engineering Science, 2015, 32(12): 1027-1035.