Award-winning teaching assistant brings big energy, t-shirts and fun facts to his tutorials

Share a fun fact with undergrad teaching assistant Kyle Sung and he might just turn you into a calculus question.

Take Julian, a javelin throwing student in one of Sung’s tutorials who was featured in this purely hypothetical question – “Julian decides to toss his javelin off the top of the Peter George Centre for Living and Learning to see how far it will go.” A calculus equation followed to find the answer (not climbing on the roof with a javelin would also be a correct response if the tutorial was run by a communications manager).

Sung came up with the idea of collecting and using fun facts during his second tour of duty as a teaching assistant. He started working as a TA in the Spring of 2023 at the end of his first year of undergrad. There were around 25 students in the room for Sung’s Intro to Mathematical Scientific Computation tutorial. Sung had an easy time establishing a personal connection with every student. “We quickly got to know each other.” He also brought candy to class which won over the students and helped keep up attendance.

During the fall term of his second year, Sung found himself in a much bigger room. He was running two tutorials for Calculus 1 for Engineers in one of the large lecture halls in the Peter George Centre for Living and Learning. For each tutorial, 500 students filled the seats.

Sung – an Honours Mathematics & Computer Science student and Schulich Leader Scholar – will tell you going from 25 to 1,000 students represents a 3900 per cent increase. He’ll also admit it initially put his powers of connecting with students on a personal level to the test.  Big rooms need big energy so that’s what Sung brought. “Students learn more when tutorials are engaging.” Students clapped at the end of the tutorial.

He ran the tutorial for to the same number of students in 2024 and 2025. All told, Sung estimates more than 3,100 students have attended his tutorials in five different first and second-year math courses. Sung plans to graduate next spring, giving him another year to TA – he could end his time at Mac having taught over 4,000 science and engineering undergrads.

Along with rounds of applause, students consistently give Sung high marks on his evaluations. He just won his second Teaching Assistant Merit Award from the McMaster Students Union and Macademics. The annual student-nominated award recognizes TAs who’ve demonstrated exceptional organizational skills, comprehensive knowledge of the subject, excellent communication skills, enthusiasm about the subject and teaching and the ability to engage students.

“I love helping people and showing students that math is beautiful. Math reveals fundamental truths and describes the building blocks of our universe. How cool is that?”

Sung also believes math should be fun. Along with featuring students like javelin-throwing Julian in the problems he poses in class, Sung wears math-themed t-shirts. He has a t-shirt to match the content students are learning that week. Sung started making his t-shirts in high school. A Mac student gave him a t-shirt to add to his growing collection and Sung likes to give out t-shirts as gifts.

Sung brings a lot of energy to his tutorials and encourages students to do the same. “I want students to get loud, to yell out answers. Math doesn’t need to be quiet.” He also wants students to be just as comfortable asking, and shouting out, questions.

Sung has some simple advice for any student who’s thinking about becoming a TA. “Be passionate about what you’re teaching. Show up with as much energy as you possibly can. Transform your tutorials – turn the problems students are working on into journeys, puzzles to be solved with real world relevance. Keep things interactive and make sure you cover all three primary learning styles – seeing, hearing and doing.”

And never, under any circumstances, toss a javelin off the roof of the Peter George Centre for Living and Learning to see how far it’ll go.