office hours, constructing exams, and grading papers. I have also had the opportunity to be a
co-instructor in three courses: Social Psychology, Multivariate Statistics, and The Intelligent
Emotions. Each course presented a wonderful opportunity to learn and to grow as a teacher.
(Summaries of student evaluations of my instruction follow.)
I co-taught Social Psychology with another graduate student through Yales Summer
Program. Among our students were Yale undergraduates, undergraduates from other uni-
versities, and advanced high school students. We designed the entire course and lectured,
led discussions, and conducted demonstrations in every class. I learned a great deal about
tailoring the pace and content of the material to the expertise and interests of the students,
which was an exciting challenge given the diversity of the class. The Multivariate Statistics
class that I co-taught was geared toward graduate students (with one or two talented under-
graduates among the ranks). I worked closely with the professor, but gave a series of lectures
over the course of the semester using many of my own materials. In this class, I learned how
to make statistics fun, by appealing to the utility of the topic (for research and for better ar-
guing a point in the real world) as well as by attempting to use compelling examples in each
lecture. Finally, I co-taught The Intelligent Emotions on-line for Yale Alumni. This was an
amazing experience, in that I had never before had the opportunity to use the World Wide
Web as a classroom. The experience presented its own challenges (e.g., Can enthusiasm for a
subject be adequately communicated over cyberspace?) and its own strengths (e.g., having
students from across the country and the globe, of all ages and backgrounds, participate in
the class). Intimately linking technological advances with classroom experiences is certain
to become the norm, and I feel fortunate to have already gotten my feet wet in this teaching
medium.
Another domain in which I have gained teaching experience over the past few years is
as a clinical psychologist in training. I was given the unique opportunity to be the Assistant
Director of the Yale Psychological Services Clinic in my fourth year of graduate school. In
that role, I not only assisted in the Assessment and Clinical Practice course for first-year
graduate students, I also supervised these students in conducting clinical work and writing
intake reports. One student described in the year-end evaluation that I was a very sensitive
supervisor who always made me feel my input was important. Another described, I cant think
of anything in ***s supervisory repertoire that could be improved. I think that she should
keep doing what she is doing. In commenting on my written feedback on write-ups of clinical
interviews, he describes, Incredible! My previous supervisor was a journal editorgetting a
report back from *** reminded me of working with him!***s comments greatly improved
the quality of my report, both in terms of content and writing style.
As an adjunct to my commitment to clinical training, my colleagues and I are working
on writing a training manual for treatment planning, goal-setting, and assessment that will
be published by Guilford Press. A shortened version of our manual is now being used
as part of Yale Universitys clinical training program. Currently, in my clinical internship
at McLean Hospital, I am leading 9 different treatment groups (e.g., cognitive behavioral
therapy skills, depression and anxiety, body awareness, life transitions, goal setting, bipolar
interpersonal issues) for individuals with severe anxiety, depression, and psychoses. Although
these treatment groups are clearly therapeutic in nature, many of them are geared towards
psychoeducation, which allows me to continue growing as a teacher as well as a clinician.
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