Why I'm an Educator: Joe Reilly, Ph.D.'20

The three people responsible for my lifelong love of STEM education are Bill Nye, Captain Picard, and my father. Bill Nye’s contagious ex­citement made learning fun and revealed the everyday world through a scientific lens. Captain Picard was my gateway to science fiction, imagining a utopia of science and diplomacy while critiquing our so­ciety and the risks of technology. Finally, my father worked long hours but reserved Sunday afternoons for me. Our most regular trip was to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. The Hall of Minerals was my favorite exhibit, with crystalline angles and vibrant colors showcasing how macroscale properties of objects result from the minute arrange­ments of their atoms. These influences, along with some outstanding high school chemistry courses, led me to pursue a chemistry major. 

I worked in a laboratory and wrote an honors thesis intending to pursue a chemistry doctorate after graduating, but I realized my se­nior year that my heart wasn’t in it. The research was intellectually stimulating but socially isolating and far removed from application. Through Alpha Phi Omega I’d tutored at an afterschool program for children of low-income families in Northeast Washington, D.C. Most were English language learners having difficulty adjusting to the Amer­ican school system. This work was fulfilling, and I realized my passion was teaching science and passing on the spark I’d felt. 

I began my pivot to science education as a teaching assistant at a D.C. middle school serving students with dyslexia and ADHD through arts-infused, experiential curricula. These students and their parents described being left behind by other institutions. I was astounded by their horror stories and how much pain they associated with learning. I began teaching my own sections of seventh grade science the next year, studying IEPs and tailoring lesson plans to immerse students in science as an active process rather than a static body of knowledge. 

I took special education courses at night to earn a master’s and thus my D.C. teaching license. The program was practitioner-focused on applying pre-written schema and adopting best practices. This helped my small set of students, but I lacked the time and training to critically evaluate why certain techniques worked or why the educa­tion sector operated as it did. While I continued teaching for several years after finishing my master’s, this line of thought eventually led me to pursue a doctorate at HGSE. 

At Harvard, I dove into research methodologies and immersed my­self in educational psychology and policy perspectives to extend my understanding and abilities. My interests led me “across the Yard” to the computer science and statistics departments to gain the quan­titative skills I needed. I engaged in design-based implementation research, partnering with practitioners to understand how to make student data salient to both students and teachers. My doctoral work with [then-Professor] Chris Dede and Principal Research Scientist Tina Grotzer focused on automated formative assessment tools that could detect unproductive struggling and provide appropriate scaf­folding. I defended my dissertation in April 2020 as the whole world was in limbo, leaving academia to leverage my skills as a data scientist. 

In industry I learned Agile methodologies and honed my techni­cal skills on vast datasets under much tighter time constraints. De­veloping and deploying models to meet specific business needs was a far cry from perusing my self-collected dissertation data. My stint in data science was fruitful in several ways but it couldn’t overcome how much I missed the classroom. Most importantly, it led me to Northeastern University where the dual knowledge of academia and industry was valued. 

At Northeastern, I serve as an assistant teaching professor and the program lead for the master’s in analytics, sitting at the nexus of life­long learning, data analytics, and workforce development. Northeast­ern’s commitment to experiential learning and innovation bridges the gap between theory and practice, situating learning in the workplace and ensuring learners know the tools and techniques they’ll need be­yond the classroom. We prepare learners from all walks of life for da­ta-centric roles in the ever-changing global economy. 

I’m curious to see where I’ll find myself in the next several decades of my educational journey. I’m drawn to higher education administra­tion and have delivered several workshops intended to upskill facul­ty and staff on the new wave of generative AI products and how to incorporate them in our work and pedagogies. I also find myself the father of three exuberant learners with their own strengths and chal­lenges. Nurturing their love of learning and helping them find what sparks them is now my top priority.

Joe Reilly, Ph.D.’20, is an assistant teaching professor and program lead for the master’s in analytics at Northeastern University in Boston