Teaching & Mentoring

Courses taught

Climate Change and Sustainable Water
MS in Sustainability Management
School of Professional Studies, Columbia University

Climate History of the Tibetan Plateau
Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University
Spring 2023.

Predicting the Effects of Climate Change on Global Forests
MS in Sustainability Science, School of Professional Studies, Columbia University
Fall 2020, Fall 2021.

Engineering Systems Architecture
Pillar of Engineering Systems and Design, Singapore University of Technology and Design
Fall 2018

Quality and Reliability
Pillar of Engineering Systems and Design, Singapore University of Technology and Design
Fall 2017

Student mentees

• Rui Guo, University of Bologna, PhD thesis
• Oanh Nguyen, Vietnam National University Hanoi, PhD thesis
• Stessie Chounoune, Rider University (as Thesis Second Reader; now MS student, UC Berkley)
• Ruby Bleskacek, Barnard College, undergraduate thesis
• Brij Banerji, Columbia University, graduate research assistant
• Leila Belgaid, Columbia University, undergraduate research assistant

Students’ testimonials

He is an excellent professor who simplifies and effectively explains complex topics. His use of various teaching tools and passion for the subject, combined with his availability to assist students, greatly enhances the learning experience. I thoroughly enjoyed his class.

He has an infectious enthusiasm which spilled over into the class.

Hung Nguyen is an amazing teacher. So energetic, very knowledgeable on the subject, clearly loves the material and is generous in sharing his knowledge, incredibly dedicated to our learning, and is a very thoughtful and kind communicator. For example, before introducing the coding assignments to us, he prefaced it with a pep talk about having a growth mindset and also made it clear he would be there to help us if we didn’t know how to code. The class field trip to Lamont was a real highlight.

Climate Change and Sustainable Water, Fall 2023

Hung is more than a teaching associate - he was basically a second professor in the course. He is an excellent instructor - the way he was able to break down R for students with little to no background in the platform/language is a skill that few possess. He is patient and encouraging. He wants students to be as curious as he is and enables that curiosity so that the students walk away learning something new. I think he would be a phenomenal professo and I am so glad that he was as involved in this course as he was. He and Brendan make a truly great team.

Predicting the Effects of Climate Change on Global Forests, Fall 2021

Having Hung as the “TA” was like having a second professor in the course. Hung managed to take a class of total programming beginners and turn most of them into enthusiastic R amateurs. The evidence was that half of the final projects contained an R analysis done by student choice. Hung is an absolute R wizard but also understands the underlying climate dynamics, which makes for a powerful combination. The combination of understanding the data and the ability to use an efficient statistical tool to do an analysis of millions of data is an incredibly powerful tool to give to climate science students. Hung made himself available on short notice and patiently but efficiently taught students not just how to complete assignments, but how to approach climate data analysis. I also got to see Hung in action brilliantly defending his doctoral thesis and can say that whoever gets Hung on their faculty will be very lucky.

Predicting the Effects of Climate Change on Global Forests, Fall 2020

Amazing TA. Does a good job explaining and is extremely dedicated.

Engineering Systems Architecture, Fall 2018