W. Ashley Griffith, PhD

Assistant Professor

Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences

College of Science

UT Arlington

I try to exude passion for my subject matter at every opportunity. When students can tell that their instructor is engaged and working hard, they tend to emulate that behavior.

I suspect I have a tendency to get more excited about the subject matter I teach than any reasonable person should, and students seem to respond positively to this. Because I follow a "less-is-more" strategy in my teaching (less focus on breadth of information and terminology and more in-depth treatment of fundamentals), this allows me to focus on themes I am most passionate about and cover them in more detail. This approach is based on the philosophy that I am training students to think critically and solve problems, regardless of what career path they choose, and also gives me the opportunity to share my excitement about the process of scientific discovery.