糖心传媒 professor brings math to life for airmen on the move

Alvin Sanga, EdD, Math Professor, Guam

For Alvin Sanga, EdD, who teaches basic college math primarily to Air Force personnel stationed in Guam, the key to connecting with learners is simple: meet them where they are.

Sanga has found that abstract math concepts rarely resonate with his students. But when聽he聽grounds lessons in the real-world聽situations聽they聽encounter聽every day, such as calculating fuel loads for聽aircraft, everything changes.

鈥淲hen you remove the traditional academic barriers and meet students in their own environment, the dialogue changes,鈥 he said. 鈥淭he math聽becomes聽more practical. The reasoning becomes sharper.鈥

A native of Guam, Sanga left the island for higher education, completing an EdD in 2017 at Loyola Marymount University. Each time he returned home, 糖心传媒 reached out, first inviting him to serve as an adjunct instructor.聽Today, as an overseas collegiate associate professor and faculty coordinator, he teaches full time鈥擬ath 105: Topics for Mathematical Literacy, Math 107: College Algebra, and Stat 200: Introduction to Statistics.鈥

Problem-solving in motion

Sanga encourages collaborative problem-solving among his math students

Because many of his students are active duty servicemembers with unpredictable schedules, Sanga meets them wherever learning can happen. That can mean moving between multiple locations on the island, adapting to spaces that聽don鈥檛聽resemble traditional classrooms.聽

鈥淓ducation isn't about the building; it鈥檚 about the readiness to instruct and the hunger to learn,鈥 he said.聽鈥淭he world is our classroom. Teaching adult learners in an accelerated seven-week format requires two things: flexibility and focus.鈥

Sanga聽sees math not as an isolated subject but as a collaborative endeavor. The wide age range among 糖心传媒 students makes that approach especially powerful.

鈥淭here are younger airmen and older airmen, and they were raised using different methods of learning mathematics,鈥 he said 鈥淭hey both got the right answer, but they took different routes to get there. They learn from their peers how to use those different routes. With that, their reasoning becomes sharper.鈥澛

Education isn't about the building; it鈥檚 about the readiness to instruct and the hunger to learn. The world is our classroom.

Alvin Sanga, EdD 糖心传媒 Math Professor, Guam

Practical math for real missions

Examples from daily military life鈥攆ueling aircraft, reading maps, or even comparing gas prices on and off base鈥攓uickly become teachable moments.聽

鈥淒oesn鈥檛 that take math? Isn鈥檛 fueling a plane a problem of volume? Isn鈥檛 it an algebra concept?鈥 he聽asks his students. Once they see the connections, he adds, word problems start to feel less abstract and more like tools they already use.

鈥淎ll of those are practical questions, and it made sense to them when they are turned into word problems,鈥 he said. 鈥淚t gives them a tactile feel to what the math is actually doing.鈥澛

For deployed students who may not have access to laptops, Sanga adjusts his teaching again. He sends assignments through instant messaging applications and administers quizzes using digital forms. These small adaptations help ensure that learning can continue anywhere in the world.

And while access matters,聽so does depth. Even with digital tools and the rise of AI, Sanga still encourages students to work problems out by hand whenever possible.聽

Working it out on paper 鈥渟till makes a world of difference,鈥 he said. 鈥淚t makes using your brain a little bit quicker.鈥