Elijah Knight is a new Anatomy and Physiology/Biology instructor at the Southeast Community College.
Knight grew up in Ogallala, a small town of about 5000 people in Nebraska. He received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Geology from the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley and his Masters Degree in Exercise Physiology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Having six years experience in teaching, Knight teaches a variety of classes at SCC, including anatomy, human physiology, environmental geology and physical geology. He said he enjoyed every science class.
Talking about his educational perspective, Knight hopes that his students don’t put too many pressures on themselves in learning.
“Learning is a process,” he said. “It’s not necessarily in destination of ‘I need to get this grade, to pass this class, to get the degree or the job that I want,’ because I am learning too, not only my students.”
According to Knight, his teaching style is a mixture of traditional lectures with various class activities, such as science tasks, discussions in small groups, research papers and so forth and based on different features of each class.
Sometimes, he can be the facilitator for his students to get through the lessons by proposing and discussing new issues related to the topics.
“Learning is supposed to be fun, supposed to be interesting,” said Knight. “It shouldn’t be an unpleasant process.”
Besides that, Knight would like to be a more approachable instructor to students.
Sometimes, he shares information about his academic background and his family during class time so that he and his students can get to know better about one another.
Knight said he really enjoys his work in SCC, where he has great colleagues.
Additionally, Knight and his wife are expecting their first child in January.