Aaron Welsch
Assistant Professor of Biology/Neuroscience InstructionProfessor Aaron Welsch ’10 is passionate about teaching neuroscience/biology in a
way that
challenges students to not just memorize facts and concepts, but also analyze how
concepts are
related and interact with each other.
He teaches sections of Introduction to Neuroscience and is the lab instructor for
Intro to
Neuroscience; Neuroanatomy and Neurophysiology; Human Physiology; and Neurochemistry
and Disease. He has been teaching at Hope since 2018.
During his graduate training Professor Welsch conducted research over a six-year period
on the
role of an androgen receptors in brain function, using Cre/IoxP technology and molecular
techniques to selectively knock the androgen receptor out of specified tissue types
and to
analyze the outcomes.
His grad school training and professional activities also have been focused on teaching
science
effectively. He mentored Michigan State University undergraduate research assistants
in the lab
in which he was conducting his research, and developed neuroscience-themed activities
and
projects for 7th and 9th-graders attending a Michigan State University STEM summer
camp.
That inspired a similar program launched at Hope in 2021 as part of the Explore Hope
summer
camp series; Hope neuroscience students partner with him to teach teens about the
brain,
using hands-on activities, in the week-long program for local 8th-to-11th graders.
During Brain
Awareness Week each spring, in an on-campus open house for families and in visits
to local
schools, with Hope students he encourages kids to think about how they could see themselves
interacting with science and explore the things the brain can control.
AREAS OF Expertise
- Hormones and behavior
- Neuroscience curriculum development
EDUCATION
- M.S., neuroscience, Michigan State University, 2017
- B.S., chemistry, Hope College, 2010
Thesis
- “Timing Is Everything: Hormonal Control of the Developing SNB in Mice,” with C. L.
Jordan and S. M. Breedlove, Michigan State University master’s thesis, 2017
Outside the College
As a Hope student, Professor Welsch was a varsity swimmer, but today he prefers golf.
He
coaches his two young kid's soccer and swimming programs. His wife, Anna ’11, majored
at
nursing at Hope College and is a nurse practitioner at a Holland medical practice.
616.395.7637
welsch@hope.eduA. Paul Schaap Science Center Room 1049 35 East 12th Street Holland, MI 49423