DS really liked his TAs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d rather be taught by a tenured faculty member with lab space than an individual who was in undergrad a few months ago. Your kid would have a better education with discussion sections or even crazier- Office hours- with professors.

You seem to be misunderstanding that in the Prof/TA model, the Prof is teaching the course. S/he has a team of TAs that teach the smaller discussion sessions. TAs are usually PhD students or at least 2nd year graduate students unless they are superstars. Not every graduate student is offered a TA spot, they are usually in high demand.

Can someone explain what the discussion sections are?

I went to a liberal arts college and so did my husband. We had lecture with a professor, TA sections where you went to work in the homework with a student who aced the class and office hours (which I’m assuming are much lengthier than a university prof) with the professor.

TA sections often didn’t involve much teaching, just a quick glance over your work, pointers to the solution, and some guidance if you were completely lost. Are grad students teaching whole courses?

[Anonymous]

As a TA, I ran weekly discussion sections (15 students?) for undergrads in a 600-person lecture course. So students didn't have interactions with the professor, but they discussed the readings with me (an early grad student). Later, I taught two seminar classes as a TA, one a reading seminar and one a research seminar.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:He’s at UC Davis. I don’t know if this is unique to Davis or if the other UCs are like this too but the graduate student TAs are really great. I know when DH and I were TAs at different schools we really cared about our students too but I was concerned that might have changed over 30-40 years.

The undergraduate upperclassmen also run so many of the programs like the ARC, transportation, events, concerts, orientation and a ton of stuff which I think makes it more fun and approachable for the incoming students. It’s a really friendly supportive place.

I was a TA at UC Davis many years ago!! 😆 I led discussion sessions, graded homework and exams!! TA put in efforts for good evaluations which will help them in their job applications as faculty members for good universities.

[Anonymous]

UF TA's are awful

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d rather be taught by a tenured faculty member with lab space than an individual who was in undergrad a few months ago. Your kid would have a better education with discussion sections or even crazier- Office hours- with professors.

You seem to be misunderstanding that in the Prof/TA model, the Prof is teaching the course. S/he has a team of TAs that teach the smaller discussion sessions. TAs are usually PhD students or at least 2nd year graduate students unless they are superstars. Not every graduate student is offered a TA spot, they are usually in high demand.

Can someone explain what the discussion sections are?

I went to a liberal arts college and so did my husband. We had lecture with a professor, TA sections where you went to work in the homework with a student who aced the class and office hours (which I’m assuming are much lengthier than a university prof) with the professor.

TA sections often didn’t involve much teaching, just a quick glance over your work, pointers to the solution, and some guidance if you were completely lost. Are grad students teaching whole courses?

In science, you're teaching the students. The professor is just lecturing a mile above their heads and disappears, and you're actually in the trenches, doing the experiments, working the problem sets, and answering all their science questions and also whatever life questions and angsty problems they have. And then you grade all their work, and they come and ask you for letters of recommendation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was a TA at a large research university. The students acted like a cute group of puppies. They asked to sit with their girlfriend/boyfriend. They set minor fires with the bunsen burners. I literally had to put out fires Some burned or stabbed themselves, but nothing serious. They were messy and jolly, and they all seemed to appreciate me, which made it pleasant.

Practically all the TAs when I taught there were foreigners, including me. No student ever complained about not understanding me, and they didn't complain about other TAs' accents either.

Not to your face, they didn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d rather be taught by a tenured faculty member with lab space than an individual who was in undergrad a few months ago. Your kid would have a better education with discussion sections or even crazier- Office hours- with professors.

You seem to be misunderstanding that in the Prof/TA model, the Prof is teaching the course. S/he has a team of TAs that teach the smaller discussion sessions. TAs are usually PhD students or at least 2nd year graduate students unless they are superstars. Not every graduate student is offered a TA spot, they are usually in high demand.

Can someone explain what the discussion sections are?

I went to a liberal arts college and so did my husband. We had lecture with a professor, TA sections where you went to work in the homework with a student who aced the class and office hours (which I’m assuming are much lengthier than a university prof) with the professor.

TA sections often didn’t involve much teaching, just a quick glance over your work, pointers to the solution, and some guidance if you were completely lost. Are grad students teaching whole courses?

In science, you're teaching the students. The professor is just lecturing a mile above their heads and disappears, and you're actually in the trenches, doing the experiments, working the problem sets, and answering all their science questions and also whatever life questions and angsty problems they have. And then you grade all their work, and they come and ask you for letters of recommendation.

Jeez. They really need to pay grad students more.

[Anonymous]

I'm a professor, and my graduate students who teach are typically _more_ conscientious than the faculty. Faculty have more competing obligations, while graduate students are anxious to do the very best job possible, not just to keep their positions, but also to learn everything they can about being academic professionals. They can sometimes make managerial or policy errors, but a good faculty supervisor will anticipate the most likely sticking-points and mentor the grad student to prevent those ahead of time. If anything, I have to remind the grad students not to start offering unlimited tutoring beyond the reasonable expectations of their office hours: their instinct is inevitably to help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a professor, and my graduate students who teach are typically _more_ conscientious than the faculty. Faculty have more competing obligations, while graduate students are anxious to do the very best job possible, not just to keep their positions, but also to learn everything they can about being academic professionals. They can sometimes make managerial or policy errors, but a good faculty supervisor will anticipate the most likely sticking-points and mentor the grad student to prevent those ahead of time. If anything, I have to remind the grad students not to start offering unlimited tutoring beyond the reasonable expectations of their office hours: their instinct is inevitably to help.

Great post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a professor, and my graduate students who teach are typically _more_ conscientious than the faculty. Faculty have more competing obligations, while graduate students are anxious to do the very best job possible, not just to keep their positions, but also to learn everything they can about being academic professionals. They can sometimes make managerial or policy errors, but a good faculty supervisor will anticipate the most likely sticking-points and mentor the grad student to prevent those ahead of time. If anything, I have to remind the grad students not to start offering unlimited tutoring beyond the reasonable expectations of their office hours: their instinct is inevitably to help.

Which is sad for underpaid workers. When I was in grad school making $34k/year (and that was good then!), I didn’t care about the undergrads. Sorry but I TAed to have enough money to eat the week, not to be your friend. I had no intention of being a PUI professor, so there was no incentive to teaching my ass off for undergrads who could give less of a shit about my subject. I can’t imagine how terrible the students are now with Claude and GPT.