Teaching

Use the filters on the right to browse courses I have taught by topic.

University of California, Berkeley

  • PS 3: Introduction to Empirical Analysis and Quantitative Methods

    Fall 2025. Graduate student instructor for David Broockman.

    Course Description (click to expand)
    Data is increasingly central to politics, policy, law, business, and life. No matter where your life or career takes you, you will need to rely on analyzing and interpreting data -- be it understanding how persuasive a study summarized in a news article is, making a case before a judge, deciding which voters to target in your political campaign, as a political leader trying to decide what policy best serves your constituents, or as a political scientist trying to understand how politics works. The purpose of this class is to equip you to better understand how to gather and interpret data that speaks to important questions of all kinds. Much of the course, although not all of it, will focus on applications in political science, teaching you how to pose and answer political science research questions in a rigorous way.

  • PS 109-B: The Politics of Public Policy

    Summer 2025. Graduate student instructor for David Broockman.

    Course Description (click to expand)
    Government policy deeply influences every aspect of our lives, including the quality of the universities we attend, how much it costs for a gallon of gas, what training we must obtain to take what jobs, what technologies are available to us to use, who we can marry, whether we can afford critical necessities such as housing, and what medical treatments we are allowed or not allowed to obtain. <br> Why do governments make the policies they do? How can advocates craft effective political strategies to influence government policy? <br> This course focuses on understanding the political forces that shape public policy, including interest groups, public pressure, political parties, and voters. In contrast to a public policy course, this course will not consider what ideal public policies should be, but rather consider why governments make the policies they do. <br> This course is suitable for anyone interested in politics or policy. Students will learn tools that will allow them to think like political strategists and understand how they and others influence government in practice.
    Syllabus Section Syllabus

  • PS 109-E: The US Executive Branch and its Political Environment

    Spring 2025. Graduate student instructor for Sean Gailmard.

    Course Description (click to expand)
    This course is about how the US government gets things done: the executive branch. Much of what the law actually says is decided in the executive branch, and almost all of it it implemented there. This involves the bureaucracy as well as (often more than) the president. Because implementation of policy defines what policy is, other parts of the government try to influence what the executive branch does, and different parts of the executive branch try to influence each other. <br> The course is structured around three major components. First, we will look at the executive branch with a focus on the president. We will analyze the president’s incentives and constraints in controlling the executive branch, and how presidents’ responses have changed American politics. Second, we will examine the executive branch with a focus on the bureaucracy. We will examine the paths by which bureaucrats make policy, and the ways that other actors try to influence them. Third, we will focus on two case studies to examine the ideas we develop in practice: one on national security and defense policy, one on immigration policy and enforcement.
    Syllabus Section Syllabus

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Tufts University

  • PS 103: Political Science Research Methods

    Spring 2021. Teaching assistant for Brian Schaffner.

    Course Description (click to expand)
    Political scientists frequently use quantitative methods to address questions about citizens’ polit- ical attitudes, elections, wars, policy outcomes, and other important political phenomena. This course will consider the general concepts underlying empirical research, including causal inference, research design, statistical analysis, and programming. The goal is to help students become in- formed consumers of quantitative social science research and provide them with useful tools for undertaking empirical research of their own.
    Syllabus

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