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rcarryesterday at 9:52 AM1 replyview on HN

There is a case to be made that teaching improves the understanding and insight of the teacher which in turn can increase their research ability. For starters, it provides a less boring way of drilling fundamentals. But more importantly, having to answer questions from students which very likely will be coming from odd and unexpected directions, helps the teacher clarify their thinking. It could well be that one of these odd questions, the answer for which the teacher takes for granted, may actually hold some insight or raise questions into what they are working on outside of class.

In a similar vein, it is recommended that if you are in a business meeting you hear what the junior positions have to say about something first and work your way up the chain of command rather than the other way around due to the junior positions being less familiar with internal processes and thus more likely to flag or suggest something completely out of left field that the higher ups might miss.


Replies

fasterikyesterday at 12:48 PM

I tend to agree that teaching can clarify one's ideas, but I don't think the benefits are equal across the board. I think the argument for benefits to research are stronger when it comes to supervising graduate students and teaching seminars. I'm far less convinced that we should have math professors teaching Calc 1 if they're not really passionate about it, and I'm especially not in favor of tying up their salary and performance evaluation with it.

Note, I'm saying all of this as someone outside of academia who is passionate about science and had a very mixed bag of teachers in undergrad.