A native New Yorker, Professor Deborah Becker holds a bachelor’s degree in scientific journalism and a master’s degree in secondary education/teaching from the City University of New York (CUNY).  She received a Graduate Teaching Fellowship from CUNY.  

Prof. Becker began teaching classes in literature, creative writing, and composition in the Languages & Literature Department in 1999. She also teaches Public Speaking in the Communication & Speech Department. Prof. Becker was appointed Director of Editorial Services and Assistant to the Associate Administrative Dean in 2014. In 2018, Prof. Becker was appointed Director of the Learning Resource & Writing Center for the Manhattan Campus of NYSCAS.

Prof. Becker has honed her abilities as a nature writer/photographer, over the years, with published works in the New York Times, New Yorker Magazine, The Daily News and The New York Botanical Garden’s Plant Science Blog. She maintains a nature-based website, BirdingAroundNYC.com, and works closely with the New York Botanical Garden, the Audubon Society, and the New York City Parks Department on environmental education, specializing in ornithology.

Teaching Philosophy:

The oldest, and still the most powerful, teaching tactic for fostering critical thinking is Socratic teaching. In Socratic teaching we focus on giving students questions, not answers. We model an inquiring, probing mind by continually probing into the subject with questions. Fortunately, the abilities we gain by focusing on the elements of reasoning in a disciplined and self-assessing way, and the logical relationships that result from such disciplined thought, prepare us for Socratic questioning. (The Center for Critical Thinking)

Favorite Quote:

“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” — Henry David Thoreau