Teaching Assistants

Steven Cayea is a junior from Deer Park, New York double majoring in Economics and Biochemistry and Molecular Biology with a minor in Psychology.  He is looking forward to his first semester as a TA, especially as he hopes to be a professor in the future, and is excited to get the chance to help others understand econometrics.

My name is James Day and I am a senior Economics Major from Washington D.C. I studied abroad in Cambridge last year where I continued my study of economics and this is my second year as a TA for Dr. Whaples. I enjoy the outdoors and have spent my past summers leading wilderness camping trips and working as a cowboy on a ranch in Wyoming. I look forward to helping you in your studies!

Hi, my name is Luke Dieterle and I’m from Brunswick, Maine. I wanted to be a TA for Econ because when taking the class with some of my friends freshman year I really enjoyed bouncing the material off of each other as I found that explaining some of the topics even helped me learn them better as well. I’m a Physics major, and an Econ and Math minor, and in my free time I enjoy going to the climbing wall in the gym and playing spikeball on the quad with my friends. I’m excited to get into the semester.

Hi, I am Clarkson Graham a senior ECN Major, and I am very excited to be a TA in the Economics Department. Since my 150 class, my interest and desire to learn more about economics has grown with all the wonderful teachers and classes I have experienced. I want to be a TA to give back and help others develop a strong love for the field of economics. As for my other passions, I love the cross section of Healthcare and Economics and want to explore careers in this domain. I am also on the track and cross country teams and am also part of the Student EMS group.

My name is Jacob Jensen and I am a senior from Phoenix, Arizona majoring in Economics and Business with a minor in Global Trade. This will be my second semester being an Economics TA and I have had the privilege to work with many great professors over the years. I enjoy being a TA because it allows me to assist other students in appreciating economic concepts while also letting me learn from my peers. I believe being a TA has helped me fine-tune my ability to convey ideas in a digestible manner and I would highly recommend it to anyone interested. Outside of being a TA, I am highly interested in the economics of trade, supply chains, and analyzing global investment patterns. If anyone is interested in pursuing an Economics degree or has questions, feel free to reach out.

My name is Christine Kirby and I am a senior majoring in Mathematical Economics and minoring in Music! I have been a Teaching Assistant for Introduction to Economics (ECN150) for Dr. Tina Dalton since the start of my junior year. It is always a joy to get to know the next generation of undergraduate students and try to convert them into become economics majors. Being a TA also helps me to cement my own knowledge of economics. I love that Wake Forest has a program for economics TAs, economics can be an extremely complicated class, and being able to help students get through it has been an incredible experience.

Hi! My name Ruixin(Annie) Ma. I am a senior and double majoring in Applied statistics and Economics, minoring in sociology. I have been working as an ECN-150 TA for the Economics Department since fall of 2022. TA is a meaningful job to me since I could learn and understand different perspectives from others through communicating and helping others. But more importantly, it taught me to become more empathetic and reflective. Through observing the study patterns from the peers and listening to their questions in economics entry level class, I could understand what are some difficulties for the transitions to this new field and how could I become more effective to help with the transitions, and what are some struggles that most students face on certain topics. Instead of asking them to learn isolated concepts with memorization, I always encourage and try to guide my peer fellows to figure out deeper connections and comprehensive structure between concepts in different sections and utilize examples, graphs, tables, and algebra to consolidate the learning process. I believe that systematically building up a studying structure with understanding of the concepts and combining graphs would be the most helpful way to study economics at the beginning.

My name is Emmet Phelan and I am from Melrose, MA. During the summers, I spend most of my time on Cape Cod, and love to golf, fish, and spend time at the beach. I have also developed skill with drone photography and videography in my free time. While I have not been a TA in the past, I have brief tutoring experience from highschool and have always enjoyed teaching material to peers. Finally, I hope everyone has an excellent semester.