Travis McGaha

he/him/his

I am a Senior Lecturer in the Computer and Information Sciences department at the University of Pennsylvania. I teach undergraduate and graduate courses :)

I am currently teaching CIS 3990 (Intermediate Computer Systems Programming) for Fall 2025.

Teaching Experience

Education

Meeting with Me

Please feel free to meet with me! I am a busy person, but I am happy to meet with students whenever I am free.

My office is Levine 269 C, and I am happy to have students visit whenever my door is open.
If you would like to schedule a specific time to meet, please click here to schedule a 1-on-1 Meeting

Just a few things to note:

• If you are in crisis and need someone to talk to, please reach out to me directly or use the link above to schedule a time to talk.
• Please be as descriptive as you are comfortable about why you want to meet

Teaching Bookshelf

The following is a collection of some of my favorite articles, confrence talks and video essays related to my job that I think are neat so I keep them "on my bookshelf" :).

None of these are made by me, I just want to put these in a convenient space where others may be able to find them.

Feel free to send me something if you think I would like it :)

Note: I do not necessarily agree with these all 100%, but I do think they are interesting and worth reading/listening

Programming

• Stop Teaching C: Talk from CppCon 2015 by Kate Gregory. Talk is about how we should stop saying "You need to learn C before learning C++". Infact, teaching C++ this way leads to bad C++ practices.
• Data-Oriented Design and C++: Talk from CppCon 2014 by Mike Actom. Talk is about designing your code in a way where you think about code in terms of data and how it interacts with the cache. Doing so greatly helps performance
• 10 Core Guidelines You Need to Start Using Now: Talk from CppCon 2017 by Kate Gregory. Covers various style things new to C++ and the C++ Core Guidelines. I particularly like the discussion on optional<T> and raw pointers.
• C++ Core Guidlines: A "style/design guide" edited by Bjarne Stroustrup and Herb Sutter about writting C++ well.
• Can C++ be 10x Simpler & Safer?: Talk from CppCon 2022 by Herb Sutter. C++ started as just being compiled down into C code, and Herb wants to do the same w/ a new language called cppfront. I hope it succeeds :)
• Rust Book w/ Improvements: An expereiment by Will Crichton and Shriram Krishnamurthi at Brown University. It teaches rust pretty well and with interactie quizzes. There is a talk on this soon at Rustconf 2023 :)
• Modern C and What We Can Learn From It: Talk from ACCU 2021 by Luca Sas. Talk came out shortly before the most modern C version (C23) so there may be some things missing, but it talks about several things that can be done to make programming in C less painful and easier to do. This has heavily affected the C code that I have written for personal use. What I teach hasn't been affceted that much though since I am mostly only do surface level C, though I would talk about these things if I had more time to talk about C.
• Comparing 'Classic C++' and 'Modern C++' Ways to Solve Programming Tasks: Talk from ACCU 2023 by Roger Orr. Excellent talk about some of the many ways things can be/have been done in C++. It compares different implementations of the same thing from various different persectives (performance, readability, saftey, etc.). I would highly recommend the first 35 minutes, the rest is still good but it requires a bit more technical depth than I think most people I would recommend this to would care to hear. Those first 35 minutes are great for covering readability and if I were to teach a class that talked more about program design, I would 100% use these examples. They are straight forward for people with even a tiny amount of C++ experience.

Grading

• Grading is a Scam (and Motivation is a Myth): by Zoe Bee. Discusses how grades demotivate students and hinders the learning process. Education should focus on channeling &l supporting intrinsic motivation. Educators can be experts on a topic but should not have authority (the power or right to give orders, make decisions, and enforce obedience) over students.
• Specification Grading Policies: by Kevin Lin. Discusses "How to get your LMS to work with your grading policies, not against them.
• Grading is Capitalist Conditioning: by Flora. Discusses how grading is imperfect, subjectively ranks students, and reinforces ideas in students mind about how smart they are, their own worth and the myth of personal responsibility.
• Traditional grading: the great demotivator: by Robert Talbert. Discussees how traditional grading cause a lot of stress and demotivation in students while not being useful as feedback. How these are insufficient to support intrinsic motivation and instead create extrinsic motivation.
• Specifications grading: We may have a winner: by Robert Talbert
• Grading is ineffective, harmful, and unjust - let's stop doing it: by Amy J. Ko.

Critical Education, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

• "Taught to be automata": Examining the departmental role inshaping initial career choices of computing students: Paper by Mara Kirdani-Ryan, Amy J. Ko, & Emilia A. Borisova. At the CS department investigated, norms and culture generally pushs students towards "prestige" jobs even if a student may not find those jobs satisfying/fulfilling.
• Is PragerU Right About Diversity in Stem?(Spoiler: NO) by Dr Fatima. Video discusses how it is important to not only have more diverse demographics, but to also teach societal scale ethics and how STEM can be used for political means. A quote from it I love is: Until we ask more than just "who is going to do the work?", STEM is gonna be kind of like the Supreme Court [of the USA]. Yes there's a woman there. There is in fact a few women there. But is it good for women?
• The House of Computing: Integrating Counternarrative into Computer Systems Education: Paper by Mara Kirdani-Ryan & Amy J. Ko. TODO
• It Is Time for More Critical CS Education: Paper by Amy J. Ko, Annah Oleson, Mara Kirdani-Ryan, Yim Register, Benjamin Xie, Mina Tari, Matthew Davidson, Stefania Druga & Dastyni Loska

Misc.

• UNHINGED: A Guide to Revolution for Nerds & Skeptics (Alternate Title: The Unity of Means and Ends): masterpeice by AnRel. Amazing. This video may be a lot to those who are not already "politically left", but this video resonates with me. I struggle to come up with a summary since it covers so much. It also continously affects how I teach to students, most notably the section starting at minute 59. The transcript is also available here.
• 5 Things I figured out while I was supposed to be dying: Talk at Meeting C++ 2017 by Kate Gregory. Good life advice, I'm glad she didn't die :)
• Thorndike won. Dewy Lost: The Most Important 4 Words about the US education System: by Mark Guzdial. TODO
• Connecting with TAs: Kristen Stephens-Martinez.
• Handling Late Homework: Kristen Stephens-Martinez.
• Recipe Programming: Geoffrey Challen. TODO
• Quantity Over Quality: Geoffrey Challen.
• One For All: Geoffrey Challen.

For Fun

I do have a life outside of UPenn, faculty are people too!
I like to spend my time with:

Awards

• Bob Bandes Memorial Student Teaching Award
  For outstanding performance as a teaching assistant. Awarded for the 2019-2020 academic year.