For courses with more than a handful of staff, it is incredibly important that you properly split up the responsibilities amongst the head TAs. If you are ever overwhelmed during the semester, then reach out, talk to your fellow head TAs and the professors. Recruit more help if necessary. Being a head TA is not an easy task, but if done right, it can be a smooth and positive experience. Settle for no less.
If you split up the duties so that a single TA handles similar responsibilities, then the process will overall be more efficient, rather than having each head TA do everything. Don’t underestimate the time commitment for “small tasks”, such as responding to administrative emails. These actually consume a lot of your time, because they break up your usual workflow. Whenever possible, try to do tasks in bulk for peak efficiency.
As you read through this document, take note of the various responsibilities and schedule a meeting with the other head TAs before the semester to determine how to distribute the tasks. It’s helpful to also consult with past semester course staffs to see how they did things, and the suggestions they have going forward.
Volunteer Culture
Say there is an exam review session the following week and you need volunteers to help run the session. It is tempting to simply ask for volunteers during the staff meeting. While this is fine on one or two occasions, do not ask for volunteers on a regular basis. By asking for volunteers, you are inadvertently encouraging ASEs to spend more hours on the course than their allotted hours! Do not overwork the ASEs.
The problem is made especially difficult because the ASEs will be hard-working, considerate individuals who care deeply about the students. As another example, if you ask for volunteers to hold one-on-one meetings with struggling students, you will induce guilt in the ASEs who do not volunteer, and so you will end up with ASEs who volunteer, yet really cannot spare the time.
ASEs applications are competitive, and some students desire 20-hour positions. So, if there are many opportunities to volunteer, some ASEs will feel pressured to volunteer as much as possible to increase their chances for these applications. Overall, this will lead to an unhealthy, overworked environment. Avoid this!
One approach is to anticipate all such events at the beginning of the semester and have the ASEs fill out their participation in advance, taking care to ensure that the number of hours they fill out matches their appointment.
Another approach is to maintain a secret mental or digital list of ASEs who haven’t been pulling their own weight recently. Distributing tasks to these ASEs is a good way to artificially rebalance the workload.
Keep in mind that offering more resources to students does not necessarily lead to more learning. Students will certainly appreciate the effort, but the best learning is done when they sit down and concentrate hard. More office hours or one-on-one meetings might sound like a good idea in principle, but is this really the best option for students? I will relate the anecdote of my friend who once spent an entire RRR week attending CS 61A review sessions. He unfortunately did not score very well on the final because did not devote enough time to individual practice.
The takeaway is to think about distributing resources more effectively, rather than distributing more resources.
Staff Meetings
Hold weekly staff meetings with the entire course staff. The agenda for the staff meetings normally includes a blend of reflection on the past week and identifying common student confusions, as well as looking forward to upcoming events (such as exams) and a primer on how to teach the next week’s material. Remember, the ASEs are usually more connected to the students than the professors are, so it is part of your job to communicate what the ASEs know about the students to the professors so that they can adapt. Find the right balance between reflection and looking ahead in your staff meetings.
Even if the meetings do not cover anything substantial, it is a good time for the course staff to bond. You can bring up important agenda items, but perhaps you don’t need to be too formal. After all, most of the content management can be done directly with the content TAs, so it’s not something you need to bring up at the meetings.
In the first few weeks, spend additional time discussing the ASEs’ experiences with teaching. This is especially helpful for first-time TAs, who may want more guidance on how to lead a section.
A Reflection Meeting
Running a successful semester-long course is not unlike running a long-term project in many ways. Some courses choose to schedule end of the semester “reflection” meetings. These meetings can be a great way to cap off a semester of hard work, and prep for a new semester by inviting new staff members. Usually, they’re a bit longer than a typical staff meeting, and it’s a good excuse to order lunch for the whole team.
In a nutshell, there are three basic questions you can ask and answer to have a successful reflection.
- What went well this semester?
- What didn’t go so well this semester?
- What big things should we change next semester?
These are just a starting point, but in a course with many moving parts it can become difficult to see the forest from the trees. There will always be an innumerable number of changes you can make to a perfect course. Taking the time to reflect will help you get a head start of the next semester. Sometimes, you can invite next semester’s staff to all or part of the meeting, so they hear first hand from everyone how things went.
Don’t forget, a brand new assignment is its own unique project. If time allows, you might schedule a debrief or reflection meeting after you’ve returned the grades for a brand new project.
Saying “No”
As an ASE, you’re a student too! As a head TA or UCS2, you’re still a student! You have a responsibility to yourself, and your friends and family just like you do to your students. Do not forget that it is perfectly OK to say “No” when you are unable to complete a task. It’s better to be honest, than to end up being stressed or avoiding your own school work.
If you’re a head TA or UCS2, make sure the rest of the staff knows that they, too, can tell you “No”. Although it may seem unlikely, your experience and knowledge may intimidate some of your peers–through no fault of anyone. Try to assure them that it’s OK to say no.
The faculty members we work with are impressive, but they were once in our shoes, too. It’s OK to tell them “no”! If an exam problem is too complex, or there’s simply no time to rewrite an assignment days before it’s released, remember that is OK to say no. It can be a hard thing to learn, especially because like so many of your peers, you want nothing but the best for your students, but it can be essential.