Cassandra Theusch’s role at Pensacola State College can be summed up in one sentence: She makes a very big deal out of very small things. We’re talking VERY small.
“As a kid I got very interested in things that are too small to be seen by the naked eye,” she says. “So, I had a really big interest in things like bacteria, things that are happening inside of cells, even molecules and proteins and DNA. It always fascinated me how something so tiny, that was such a conceptual thing, that didn’t even make sense to our eyes, could impact everything.”
Theusch brings that impact to life for her students as an assistant professor in PSC’s Department of Natural Sciences.
“As I moved along in my education and my training, I realized, ‘Hey, the whole world of biology is based on these tiny little things,’ so I try to give that to the students too, to help them understand that at the molecular level, at the cell level, that’s really what decides something as big as human medicine. You have to understand that before you can take it to the level of bones or muscles.”
Brand new to both the Pensacola area and to the College – this is only her second semester here – Theusch is originally from Wisconsin.
“I grew up in rural Fond du Lac County and I got my undergraduate degree at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point,” Theusch says. “That was a really great experience because that was where I really got to see role models of really excellent teachers. It was a very rigorous school, especially with its biological sciences and chemistry department, but at the same time it was a small enough school where the students had close relationships with the faculty.”
That relationship, she says, was her inspiration to become a teacher. After earning her degree, she taught for two and a half years at the University of Arkansas Cossatot.
“It’s a really small community college that focuses on rural populations in the southwest Arkansas area,” she says. “That’s where I got most of my on-the-job training for teaching.”
She saw the position opening at Pensacola State and liked what the College and the area had to offer.
“What struck me was the geographical reach of PSC,” Theusch says. “Also, I knew that PSC was very student-centered. The more that I learned, the more I was really interested in being a part of this.”
Theusch soon learned that PSC classrooms allowed her to enjoy the student-teacher relationships she had admired at Stevens Point.
“I’m really fortunate because I’m in a place where I’m really hands-on with my students and I have a lot of in-person classes, which means I actually get to see the students face-to-face, which is wonderful,” she says.
Theusch says she’s fascinated by the eclectic backgrounds and motivations of her students, motivations that help guide her approach to teaching.
“One thing I love about here is that the students come from so many different places as far as their interests,” she says. “One of my big teaching questions is, ‘How do we tap into their intrinsic motivations?’ Students come to me motivated by things like, ‘Oh, I need to get into this nursing program,’ or, ‘Oh, I need this grade to pass,’ or ‘Gee, I really need to make this amount of money,’ and those are all very noble motivations, but the research shows that students’ intrinsic motivations, their interest in something, actually thinking that something is their calling, is a very powerful tool for learning. It means they’re going to memorize things faster and they’re going to engage deeper with the material.”
Reaching the students’ intrinsic motivations, however, is the challenge.
“That’s the challenge that I think a lot of us instructors face: How do we get them to be intrinsically interested? My hope is that the fact that I am super intrinsically interested in things like molecules and cells will rub off and they’ll see the impact of what that means. That’s my never-ending quest, to try to figure out how to get that out of students.”
One of the secrets, she says, is to tie the fantastic world of science to the real world.
“If you can tie everything to a real-world scenario, that means they’re instantly relating to it,” Theusch says. “When you say, ‘Hey, you know all those medications that we take? That is why understanding these little molecules is important,’ you then see that spark of, ‘Oh, wow, yeah, I take a medication, or I know someone who has that disease that’s part of their DNA’ or whatever. So, real-world scenarios really light them up.”
Sometimes it’s the student who brings the real world into the conversation, such as the student who first brought Theusch’s attention to the deadly COVID-19, otherwise known as the coronavirus.
“It had recently just appeared in the news, but I hadn’t yet read about it, so it was new to me when the student mentioned it,” Theusch says. “I always love it when we’re learning together. Anyone who’s a trained scientist knows that they’re never an expert, that they’re stymied by how much they don’t know, so anytime a student can teach you, it’s just worth everything.”
-- Mike Suchcicki
