Jennifer Hood-DeGrenier: Helping students grow in many different ways

Professor of Biology, 2020 Alden Award Winner

When biology professor Jennifer Hood-DeGrenier was in college, she was taught in traditional ways—chalkboards, lectures, note taking. She knows those teaching approaches aren’t particularly effective for many students, so, over the years, Hood-Degrenier has experimented with different strategies to engage students in the classroom. 

“I want to get students excited about learning and excited about the content,” she said. “So, I teach with enthusiasm, and I try to help them to join into that enthusiasm by finding ways for them to make personal connections with the material and emphasizing how it really is relevant to them.”

She puts a lot of thought into how to make participation comfortable for everyone.

“Not everybody naturally is going to speak up and raise their hand,” she said. “In all of my classes, I incorporate various ways for students to participate, whether it’s in whole class discussions or digitally through responding to questionnaire polls, or working in small groups first and then having groups share.”

And sometimes, she said, it’s important to focus not just on what they are learning, but on how to learn. With freshmen, she talks about study skills and how to engage with material rather than trying to memorize it. She positions science lessons within a larger framework so students can understand the bigger picture of what they are learning. 

“Success is helping students progress and grow in many different ways,” Hood-DeGrenier said. “Everybody takes something different away from a class, but you can see that you’re having an impact on helping students to go places that they wouldn’t have gone before, to think about things that they wouldn’t have thought about otherwise. That is rewarding.”

In spring 2024, Hood-DeGrenier brought three undergraduate students she has mentored to an academic conference at UMass Amherst. The students presented their research, answered tough questions posed by a faculty member, and got a tour of the science labs. 

“They were just visibly excited imagining what kind of research they could do and excited about graduate school,” she said. “We give them fundamental skills. If we can ignite the spark in some of them to go on to those larger places and continue their journeys, that’s great.”