Andis Klegeris
Professor
Department of Biology
The University of British Columbia Okanagan Campus
Dates of Visit: March 4 – 8, 2019
Purpose of Visit
During his visit to CHES, Andis would like to learn about the various research avenues pursued by investigators from the CHES community with a goal of identifying areas of common interests. He would also like to discuss his current and future pedagogical research projects related to strategies for developing and assessing problem-solving and critical-thinking skills of students.
Biography
Andis Klegeris obtained a D.Phil. degree from the University of Oxford, UK, and completed his post-doctoral training at the UBC Department of Psychiatry. He joined the department of Biology on the UBC Okanagan campus in 2007 where he established the Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology studying neuroimmune mechanisms and neurodegenerative diseases. At UBC Okanagan, Prof. Klegeris instructs upper-year Pharmacology and Biochemistry courses. He is engaged in pedagogical innovation, research and scholarship. He experiments with the mixed-mode approach of undergraduate course delivery, and has adapted problem-based learning techniques to the large undergraduate classroom setting. He studies the effects of active learning techniques on the problem-solving and critical-thinking abilities of students. Prof. Klegeris has led several large-scale campus-wide studies of problem-solving skills aimed at discovering the dynamics of this skill set in undergraduate students, as well as identifying instructional techniques effective at advancing this critical competency of students.