About me / Teaching & Mentoring

Teaching

Teaching


“Shailja is arguably the best EE TA in this school. She was super kind with explanations that were clear and helped me with the quiz.” Anonymous (Digital Image Processing Course, Fall 2019)

“Thank you so much for being an amazing communication TA! I very much appreciate the tips you gave to write a research paper and literature review, as well as the feedback on our group’s research paper draft. I had never read a research paper before this program, but now I have a great understanding of how to write one.” Medha (Human-Computer Interaction Course, Summer 2021)

    “My teaching philosophy is to create a student-centered environment fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive classroom using technology. Judicious use of technology can act as a catalyst in promoting inclusive teaching. Some examples are employing live voting sessions, online survey forms, weekly reflection, anonymizing sensitive discussions, and providing judgment-free platforms to express opinions. Similarly, including experimental data, its visualization, and analysis as interactive computational notebooks in the class material goes a long way in explaining theoretical concepts than simply stating them."
    Teaching statement
  1. Instructor-in-record for "Diagnostic AI: Transforming healthcare using image processing and learning from biomedical images ", Summer 2023. Apart from designing the course topics, syllabus, and assignments from scratch, the course includes 14 hours of in-person lectures and class projects. Short course description
    Long course description
    Syllabus
  1. TA for "CMPSCW 8: Introduction to Computer Science ", Summer 2022

  2. Communication TA for "Machine Intelligence: An introduction to optimization and machine learning", Summer 2021.
    An introduction to a variety of optimization techniques in machine learning including convex optimization, dynamic programming, and evolutionary computation. Students investigate the connections between optimization and machine learning using approaches such as reinforcement learning, regressions, neural networks, and support vector machines.

  3. Communication TA for "Human-Computer Interaction: Perception and Correlation Development in Virtual Reality", Summer 2021.

  4. TA for "ECE 178: Digital Image Processing", Fall 2019
    Basic concepts in image and video processing. Topics include image formation and sampling, image transforms, image enhancement, and image and video compression including JPEG and MPEG coding standards.

  5. TA for "CS 130B: Data Structures and Algorithms", Spring 2019

  6. TA for "CS170: Operating Systems", Winter 2019

Mentoring



Mentoring


“I am extremely thankful to have an excellent mentor facilitating a true learning experience composed of challenges and roadblocks. I believe my mentor provided exceptional instruction, which I will reflect on through my future work and research journey.” Alex

“My mentor Shailja gave me meaningful feedback on all of my proposed ideas. In addition, Shailja gave me valuable and timely insight and guidance in this project which allowed me to work at my desired pace. To me, this mentorship worked perfectly as it guided me to come up with new ideas without hand-holding the research experience.” Claire

    “Through my mentorship, I aim to identify the individual needs of students at different levels (with little or no previous research experience), from master’s to pre-college programs, and create a collaborative learning environment. My goal is to inspire and empower the next generation of researchers to solve research problems related to complex neurological disorders. While I regularly meet with my mentees, I also prioritize defining boundaries and allowing them to develop independent research skills. I have adopted the approach of asking my mentees bigger-picture questions about their research goals and the potential impact of their work for social good."
    Mentorship statement
  1. Alex Wang, Summer 2022, previously in Homestead High School, will join UC Berkeley.

  2. Claire Chen, Summer 2022, previously in Lynbrook High School, will join UIUC.

  3. Kathy Li, Summer 2022, previously in Davis Senior High School, will join Brown University.

  4. Sanjay, Summer 2022, previously in Foothill High School, will join UC Berkley.
  1. Vikram Bhagavatula, Major in Computer Engineering, ECE, 2022-2023. Will join CMU for graduate studies.

  2. Krithika Thanigaivelan, Major in Electrical Engineering, ECE, 2022-2023.

  1. Jeanette Quintero, BS in Cell and Developmental Biology, 2021
  1. Heejeong Nam, UCLA exchange student (Summer 2022).

  2. Ronak Kaoshik, Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar (Summer 2020), Currently at UCLA for Master's Program.

  3. Nisha Balaji, Dougherty Valley High School (Summer 2020), Currently pursuing major in the Computer Science at Caltech.

Contact

Email: shailja α ucsb.edu

Office: HFH 4162




Vision Research Lab

Harold Frank Hall 4162

University of California, Santa Barbara