After 25 years of teaching computer science at UBC, Dr. Paul Carter retires

According to Paul Carter, the worst piece of career advice that he was given was when he was a high school student. Someone had told him that computing was too newfangled at the time and that it wasn’t clear how many opportunities there were going to be in that field.

So, despite having a strong interest in computers, Dr. Carter studied applied mathematics for his bachelor’s degree at the University of Sheffield. During his graduate school years at UBC, he started to take more courses in scientific computing, eventually examining a problem in computer vision for his PhD.

While he had experience as a teaching assistant, his first foray into leading a course was when the Head of the mathematics department asked him to teach an introductory calculus course. He thought it would be a fun challenge, but after teaching his first class, he was hooked.

“I continued to look for opportunities to teach,” said Dr. Carter. “It became very clear to me very quickly that teaching was the high point of the day.”

After earning his PhD, he taught math and computer science for seven years at Capilano College (now University) before joining UBC’s Department of Computer Science.

For over two decades, he helped students learn computer science concepts, seeing the transition from chalk and blackboards to screens, from pen and paper to laptops. Dr. Carter was one of the first professors in the Faculty of Science to design and implement a flipped classroom approach to teaching, helping students actively learn material in class. He is the recipient of several UBC Killam Teaching Prizes and departmental teaching awards for his excellence in teaching. 

In addition to teaching, Dr. Carter was formerly the Director of the BCS (second degree) program, the Associate Head of Undergraduate Programs and the Associate Head of Operations. Moreover, he was involved in helping to create inclusive spaces for the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, helping students understand the impact of academic misconduct and improving computer science education at UBC.

This interview was edited and condensed for clarity.  

How did you get into the computer science field? 

My path into computer science is actually a little bit unusual. I always had an interest in computing, even in high school. My high school didn't have a computer lab, but I went to night school with a friend to learn programming in a language called BASIC. I was fortunate enough to have one of the very early home computers and taught myself the basics of how to program.

My bachelor's degree was actually in applied mathematics. Although I did take some entry level computing courses, that really wasn't the focus of my first degree. When I decided to go to grad school at UBC, I took a number of different courses and one of them was in scientific computing — that really interested me, so I took more computing courses. For my PhD, I decided to work on a problem in computer vision and moved a little bit further into the field of computing. 

What was your journey like into teaching computer science?  

When I first came to UBC, I was a graduate student in the Institute of Applied Mathematics and worked as a TA. Towards the end of my first term, the Head of the math department asked if I’d be interested in teaching a section of Math 100 the following term. I thoroughly enjoyed that experience and from then on, I taught an undergraduate course almost every term throughout my graduate studies.

After I graduated from the PhD program, I was an instructor at Capilano University where I taught mathematics and computer science. I really enjoyed the opportunity to teach in both areas. I worked alongside a number of people who were very influential on my early teaching career, including Professor Yvonne Coady, who is now at the University of Victoria and Northeastern University. A position then opened up at UBC, and here I am, 25 years later.

What do you enjoy most about teaching? 

Working alongside really bright, dedicated and hardworking students. At UBC, we have students from all over the world — it’s such an amazing mix of people in one classroom. It's really a privilege to work with students who are so motivated and so gifted. Many of them are going to go on to do amazing things, and I think that’s an incredible opportunity.

It's those light bulb moments when a student will initially be confused about something and you provide an explanation and they go, “Oh, okay, I get it now!” that are really rewarding.

My favourite part of the day has always been going to class, regardless of whatever else I was doing. It's the part of the day that I always look forward to.

How did you see teaching change over the course of your career? 

It's changed quite dramatically. During that first course that I taught, everything would be written on the blackboard with chalk, and the students would sit there and copy it down onto a piece of paper. Eventually, I moved to template notes – an approach to teaching that I learned at Capilano University – which allowed for more time in class to work on problem solving. 

Another big influence for me was the flipped classroom. Around 2009, during my sabbatical, I developed a series of screencasts or short videos to support a flipped classroom approach to teaching APSC 160, an introductory software design course for engineering students. Students would spend a short amount of time before class learning basic concepts so that when they came into the classroom, they could learn to apply those concepts through hands-on exercises. Students really appreciated that approach to learning and several courses are now taught using the flipped classroom format. It was a pretty major step forward.

Did your teaching philosophy change over the years? 

Over time, you realize that we should really be talking about a learning philosophy rather than teaching philosophy. Teaching doesn’t happen unless someone learns, and learning is an internal process. As an instructor, I can provide motivation, examples, scaffolding — but students have to engage if they're going to learn.

In addition to being a former director of the BCS program, what else were you involved in at the department? 

I was Associate Head of the Undergraduate Program when Bill Aiello was Head of the department and Associate Head of Operations when Chen Greif was Head. Those were periods of significant growth for me in terms of leadership. Working alongside Bill was an incredible experience. I was still fairly junior at that point too, so it was a major learning experience for me. What I appreciated most about working with Chen was the trust that he put in me to get things done, especially during COVID, when we had to pivot our entire operation online, very quickly. It was a great opportunity to work under their leadership, so both of those periods were really memorable years for me that I look back on fondly.

Can you tell me more about the different service activities you were involved in at UBC? 

One of the first things that I was involved in at UBC was the Positive Space campaign, which was spearheaded by Anne-Marie Long, an equity advisor at UBC at the time. I felt it was an opportunity to get involved in something that was important for the visibility of 2SLGBTQIA+ community on campus. That campaign has been a huge success — it's great to see so many Positive Space campaign stickers on doors around the department and other places that allows people in the 2SLGBTQIA+ community to recognize safe spaces where they can just be themselves. Making that stand in support of that community was really important for me too. 

I was also on the President’s Advisory Committee on Student Discipline for about 10 years. Over time, the committee adopted an educative approach to misconduct, ensuring that students understood the impact of their actions, in particular, on other students.

I was also the first director of the Computer Science department’s Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative, which was a huge push at UBC to overhaul science education. A significant amount of work was done by the department in terms of adopting active learning in the classroom, as opposed to the more standard “content delivery” approach to teaching. 

What are you most looking forward to when you retire?  

A bit more time for traveling is going to be welcome. I've got a big trip planned after my last day of work. Also, more time for hobbies — I've been interested in photography for a long time. And definitely a little bit more time for exercise. So, more time for myself, more time to relax. But I'll really miss parts of the job too.

Looking back over my career, I think I've been incredibly fortunate to learn from some really amazing people. At Capilano University, I learned so much about effective teaching from the people who worked there. At UBC, there's some fantastic research and really interesting ideas around teaching and learning that I've picked up from my colleagues. It's just been an amazing privilege to be part of the department. So, I think of myself as having been extremely fortunate to have landed a position here.