About Me

Hi! My name is Jonathan Liu, and I am currently a PhD student at the University of Chicago, where I am fortunate enough to be advised by Professor Diana Franklin.

My work is in Computer Science Education, focused on curriculum development in a broad range of settings. My thesis work focuses on problem-solving skills in theoretical CS. In the long term, I believe that understanding and teaching these skills directly can increase learning, persistence, and equity in theory courses.

I am a Class of 2026 Siebel Scholar, and am generously supported in part by a Liew Family Graduate Fellowship. I am also a UChicago Committee on Education Graduate Fellow.

In my free time, I solve crosswords, amass (and explore) restaurant recommendations, and play games of all kinds (especially trick-taking games).

I am looking for teaching-track faculty positions that begin Fall 2026.

Please feel free to reach out at jonliu (at) uchicago (dot) edu!

Select Research

Below is some selected work that reflect my primary research direction.

Journal Publications

Conference Publications

Posters

  • "How Do Learners Use Scratch Paper When Working on Dynamic Programming Problems?" Zihan Wu, Jonathan Liu, Erica Goodwin, Diana Franklin. SIGCSE TS 2025. Poster. Writeup.
  • "Teaching Algorithm Design: A Literature Review." Jonathan Liu, Seth Poulsen, Hongxuan Chen, Grace Williams, Yael Gertner, Diana Franklin. SIGCSE TS 2024. Poster. Writeup.

Final Projects for Graduate-Level Courses

Teaching

Here are some courses I've helped teach, along with some material I made in the process.

University of Chicago

CS 27100 - Discrete Math (Instructor), Summer 2025
CS 27200 - Theory of Algorithms (Head TA), Spring 2022/2023

Algorithms materials aren't public because they may be reused in future courses, but are available upon request.

UC Berkeley

Math 1B - Calculus (TA), Fall 2018
Part 1: Integrals
Part 2: Sequences and Series
Part 3: Differential Equations