Is it easy for you to combine the roles of scientist and teacher?
To me, it comes together quite naturally. When I was beginning my career, I mainly wanted to do science. If you’re not a complete introvert, you want to share your research with others. But when you dive deeply into a specific problem, it’s not easy to share the joy of discovery, because few people understand your issue. That’s why it’s great to have students – you don’t only teach them what you do but also the broader context, so they understand what impact it might have.
As a PhD candidate, I was required to teach from my first year. I taught several practical exercises in a subject that was not my focus, and I had to learn it. When you teach, you need to understand the broader context, which means you have to study much more than what would be sufficient for regular scientific work. Thanks to teaching, I actually understand my research focus better.
At the same time, if you want to develop your research, you need people who understand the field and the topic well. Some I accepted from abroad or other Czech institutions, but some of the best scientists in the team were once my students. If I worked at a research institute outside the university, I couldn’t expand my research as broadly as I can at a university, thanks to the constant influx of new students. The university environment is highly dynamic: every student brings a new perspective, every group of students focuses on something different, some stay for their PhD or collaborate on projects, and others go abroad and return with new experiences. We host international interns from many places working on various topics. This connects generations and people with different experiences. Everyone who has spent time with us has brought something valuable. There’s always fresh blood and new ideas at the university; that’s why I wouldn’t want to work at a research institute without students, and I’m glad to be in the university environment.
You’ve had experience teaching abroad. What does that bring you as a teacher?
At various foreign universities, I’ve taught short specialised courses, mainly intensive courses on data analysis in our field. You get to know different cultural contexts and how people in different cultures adopt new things and how quickly they apply them in practice. Outside Europe, we’ve had long-term collaboration with Taiwan, for example, where I supervised a PhD candidate and where my former Czech PhD candidate now works as an assistant professor. These are interesting experiences, but the greatest benefit of teaching abroad for me is expanding our network of collaborators. This allows us to send our students to various foreign institutions and has also ensured a steady stream of international interns interested in working with us.
What advice would you give to a new colleague starting to teach their first course?
I’ve certainly advised such colleagues, but they were so capable that they managed on their own (laughs). I’d recommend setting up a system for gathering student feedback. When someone teaches for the first time, it’s naturally not perfect, and they need to test, for instance, what’s too difficult for students and what’s too trivial. They should ask students about this or check it with an optional test. There’s a course opinion poll in the University’s Information System, but students often only fill it out when they’re very dissatisfied. If the lecture is mostly fine and there are just small things that could be improved, they hardly ever write that in the poll, and the teacher doesn’t find out. When someone is starting out, they can emphasise to students that they welcome feedback – whether through the poll or outside of it – because they genuinely want to use it to improve their teaching. Students appreciate this approach and respond positively.
Interviewer: Karolína Zlámalová, Quality Office RMU (zlamalova@rect.muni.cz)