Teaching Statement
Jiyoung Chae
My teaching is inextricably intertwined with my interests in research, since I feel that teaching and research
complement one another. While being strongly committed to research and often being thrilled by the research
process
of
identifying
and
solving
economic
puzzles,
I
enjoy
transmitting
this
excitement
to
students.
I
believe
that
continuous
interaction
with
students
could
not
only
foster
interest
and
understanding
for
the
students,
but
also
make
my
research
more
proactive
and
productive.
My
overarching
goal
for
any
course
that I teach is to instill an appreciation of the importance of scientific thinking and inspire students to take
their scientific thinking skills beyond the classroom to tackle real-world problems.
To achieve this goal,
I
particularly focus on establishing the following three aspects for my teaching:
1) lectures that foster intuitive
understanding and critical thinking, 2) assessments that promote independent work, and 3) an open learning
environment that involves questioning and collaboration. Teaching inspires me to search for new connections
between relevant world examples and a theoretical field that I enjoy.
It is a pleasure to share this experience
with students, and I look forward to honing my techniques for teaching, challenging, and supporting future
students as they develop their appreciation for economics or related fields in the world that surrounds them.
I
worked
as
a
teaching
assistant
for
Microeconomic
Principles
at
the
University
of
Illinois
at
Urbana-
Champaign (UIUC) for three semesters.
Many of my students were college freshmen who enter the class-
room not knowing what to expect from economics.
Since my research interests are related to urban and real
estate economics, I have taken advantage of this endeavor by finding a way to relate my teaching materials
to their daily life and policy-oriented applications.
For example, when the law of supply and demand was
introduced,
we discussed how the principle determines housing prices and how supply-demand imbalance
led to the housing market crash, followed by the financial crisis in 2008.
I have also enjoyed being able to
draw
on
examples
from
my
own
work
to
use
in
the
classroom.
In
order
to
help
the
students
to
have
ade-
quate or well-formed background knowledge, each of my classes starts with a short review of the key points
from the previous class and ends with practice questions over the day’s work and preview of the topics for
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