Teaching

The student evaluations for a course I taught at Columbia University last fall—called Melody—communicate a sentiment and narrative that confirms my own feeling that it was some of the truest teaching I’d done to date. To quote directly:

“I think it is one of the best classes I've ever taken, both in quality of teaching and content, and enjoyment.”

“His students walk away thinking they were lucky enough to sign up for a random class that ended up being a gold mine of understanding that no one except those in that specific class will ever get to.”

“It felt like he showed up, like all of us students, with an open hand and a question. As a class, a ship of curious minds, we traversed the uncharted, and arguably unchartable, expanses and depths of ‘melody,’ starting and leaving every class with questions, not answers, and being comfortable in the uncomfortability of that unknownness. Professor Arjomand is one of those people that, it’s clear, has a sort of eternal fountain of unique ideas and questions, one of those people you want to pull out your notebook and write down every sentence he says, not to quote it, idolize it, but because the choice of words opens up new pathways for inquiry inside you, and you need to preserve that word choice to be able to be inspired again."