College of Education and Human Development

Department of Educational Psychology

Faculty spotlight on Dr. Sam Choo, assistant professor, special education

Sam Choo, PhD, is an assistant professor in the special education program of the Department of Educational Psychology. 

Sam Choo

Sam holds a doctoral degree in special education technology from the University of Kentucky, a master’s degree in special education from the University of Kansas, and a bachelor’s degree in special education from Daegu University in South Korea. Before joining the University of Minnesota, Sam was a research faculty at the University of Oregon and a senior learning scientist at Amplify Education. He previously worked as a lead teacher, a special education teacher and a paraprofessional serving students with disabilities in various classroom settings and grades as well.

Dr. Choo’s research focuses on leveraging technology to support students with learning difficulties in mathematics and their teachers. He is working to develop and validate game-based mathematics intervention for elementary school students and to improve accessibility and sustainability of multimedia-based contextualized mathematics intervention for secondary school students. Additionally, he is the current President Elect of the technology division of the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) and the Associate Editor of the Learning Disability Quarterly (LDQ) journal.

Classes Dr. Choo currently teaches:

He also plans to develop and teach special education technology courses within the department.

In his spare time, he loves spending time outside with his wife and daughter. He enjoys smoking meat and fish, and he can grill authentic Kentucky bourbon chicken. He is also an avid mountain climber and recently started learning to play ice hockey. He is looking forward to having a traditional Minnesota winter with a good amount of snow and ice.