Hannah Spero, University of Notre Dame

Hannah Spero

Doctoral Student

Hannah Spero is a Ph.D. candidate in the Civil Engineering, Environmental Engineering, and Earth Sciences (CEEES) Department with a focus in Environmental Fluid Dynamics at the University of Notre Dame. Hannah has taught a variety of courses at Notre Dame in CEEES, including three years of co-teaching the Graduate First-Year Seminar and building it into an official 1-credit class. More recently, Hannah has served as one of two first-year engineering teaching apprentices in the College of Engineering, where she teaches Engineering Design and Engineering Computing to first-year undergraduates. As an instructor, Hannah prioritizes (1) accessibility, (2) real-world applications of classroom concepts, and (3) discernment and mentorship. She facilitates learning through activities and projects driven by linking classroom topics to students’ lived experiences. For example, in a recent course, “(Un)natural Disasters and Natural Hazards,” which she taught with the Forever Learning Institute of South Bend, she asked students to reflect on their own experiences with natural hazards, and students then presented those experiences to their peers as a final project. Whether in a traditional classroom or an outdoor geoscience setting, Hannah aims to make her classroom accessible and inclusive. In support of this priority, she has designed virtual reality (VR) modules to overcome some traditional physical ability demands of field-based geoscience courses. Before her time at Notre Dame, Hannah received her B.S. in Geosciences from Boise State University, where she taught her first college-level courses (Algebra II and Trigonometry) and developed her first VR module. Hannah’s greatest teaching inspiration was her first geology professor, Nick Zentner of Central Washington, who taught her that every rock has a story, which led her down a path that is continuing to unfold.