<p>It seems my professor friend was uninformed about the reason for capping but that was the maximum he was allowed to admit into his class (and remember his department has no graduate program). He had to turn away 35 students, and is on leave this year, so he's not offering the course.</p>
<p>Evey prof worth her salt spends many hours preparing for classes, even those who've taught the same course multiple times. The materials change with new publications, new perspectives, new events (think about some one who started teaching Chinese history or politics in the 80s and is still teaching the same course this year--all that was written and said in the 80s is hopelessly outdated). So, yes, I can easily see a prof, even a veteran prof spending 15-20 hours per lecture. Just putting visual materials together can take up a huge amount of time, even for profs who've written the textbook</p>
<p>You were not shut out of a class at Dartmouth but the 35 on the waiting list of my friend's class at Dartmouth were. That was last spring, not 25 years ago (that history, like that of China, needs updating).</p>
<p>I'm suspicious of the Brown story, too. I did English/Comp Lit (at Yale, a long time ago). I had one seminar that was taught only by a grad student, and I signed up for it specifically because I wanted to take a class taught by that grad student. He had been my TA in a discussion section of a class two years before. About half of the people who had been in that section signed up for his seminar; we were quite the fan club for him. No one took lit courses taught entirely by grad students unless they really, really wanted to.</p>
<p>My daughter is at Chicago now, in English. It's the same story. Almost every class has one or more TAs who help students, lead separate discussion sections (if it's a lecture class) or occasionally lead class, and help with grading. It's also common for senior grad students at some point to offer a seminar on a topic related to their theses, but no one forces anyone to sign up for them, and the topics are usually obscure enough that no one is going to sign up for one unaware.</p>
<p>What does happen at Chicago is that senior grad students teach some sections of the Core Humanities and Social Sciences classes (generally taken by first- and second-year students) some quarters. That's a little questionable, in my book, although my daughter had better experiences with grad students than she did with professors in her Hum and Sosc. Her Sosc teacher, who was just finishing her dissertation, was hot stuff -- lots of prizes, very much in demand for presenting papers, and an exciting teacher. She had one quarter of faculty and one quarter of grad student in Hum, and the faculty member was a complete dud. (The other slightly sleazy thing Chicago does is hire people as assistant professors essentially only to teach in the Core. Some of them are great teachers, and very sought-after by students. Others aren't. Regular tenured or tenure-track teachers also teach in the Core, too.)</p>
<p>I was a Classics major at Brown in the mid 70's and I do not recall a single TA. Professor Donovan, one of the most popular professors in the department, taught every section of Intro Greek the year I started. I don't recall what the Latin sequence was but perhaps someone on the board can and can remember if TA's taught in the department. I knew grad students.... shared a carrel with one of them at the Rock; but he was there to write his dissertation and I have no memory of him teaching classes.</p>
<p>Interesting thread. I learned a lot. Thanks to all who posted. I'm with the camp who believes that I'm paying the big bucks for professors, not TAs. TAs should be what the name implies - assistants. That being said, I think there is also a place for guest lecturers. Some of the best teachers I had in grad school and also in community college were people who actually had jobs in what they were teaching. Nothing like getting a computer course taught to you by an engineer in the field. My tax law course was taught by a tax lawyer. Great for getting those knotty questions answered from someone with with real experience. How fabulous it would be to have a creative writing course taught by a published novelist, or a marine biology course taught by a marine biologist from an aquarium rather than a university. It gives people an idea of how they might use their schooling for a position in industry.</p>
<p>Although it's not an ivy, I will include my experience years ago in engineering at Rice. All my classes were taught by professors. I was able to meet with professors for help during office hours. Classes were larger than 20 students - maybe around 35. Several were as large as 100 (freshman chem, microecon, statistics). Freshman Calculus was self-paced, but the professor was available for questions. A couple of classes like upper level language and econ classes were smaller than 10 students.</p>
<p>The funny thing about being a TA - I was one at Chicago. The reality was that I could deliver a lecture much, sometimes much MUCH better than the full tenured faculty, sometimes even the more famous ones. I was often better read in the most recent research, more up-to-date with current academic currents, and I could better relate to those to whom I was speaking. What I was NOT well-prepared to do was to deal with all of the really good questions that came up in the class discussions I led, and which would have required a lot of experience to deal with well. (And I received precisely NO training to do so; the difference between this and my TA friends at Yale - and granted this was 30 years ago - they were often called upon to TA "overflow" sections in subjects for which they were totally unprepared.)</p>
<p>I don't know what it means for a TA to "replace" a prof at the undergraduate level. Compared with what I experienced at a LAC, I "replaced" a prof every time I stepped into a classroom, every time I answered a question, every time I graded a paper or provided comments, every time I met with a student, and every time I prepared a final grading sheet for the prof to sign. That's precisely what I was paid to do.</p>
<p>Whether it was worth anyone paying the equivalent of $45k a year to listen to or be graded by me is for the buyer to decide.</p>
<p>("The other slightly sleazy thing Chicago does is hire people as assistant professors essentially only to teach in the Core."</p>
<p>Yup. They did that 30 years ago as well - sometimes the grad students, who assisted profs with their research, were considered more valuable than the hired guns. They paid 'em like crap too.)</p>
<p>I take back my suspicion about cloverdale7's Brown claims.</p>
<p>I looked at the catalogue. There are a LOT of writing courses offered, and a LOT of them are taught by MFA students and other non-faculty. "Literary Arts" is essentially the non-nonfiction writing program. If cloverdale7's son is concentrating in Literary Arts, he has probably had a bunch of classes taught exclusively by non-faculty.</p>
<p>Columbia Core courses are also to a great extent taught by graduate students, including second-year graduate students. They may or may not be innately talented teachers; they certainly lack experience.</p>
<p>Cloverdale: I echo your thoughts. My Vassar son is getting an entirely different education than his twin sister at Harvard. Both would have done equally well at one another's schools. </p>
<p>At Vassar, the classes are small, the professors know every kid and care. In addition, the professors (and advisors) are outstanding; many are Harvard, Princeton, etc. graduates. Basically, it's the same pool of professors who apply to teach at most of these schools. They go where there's a job opportunity or a geographic location they want to be in. Certainly the Vassar professors are very invested in their teaching.</p>
<p>My son is in his first large class (most classes have about 15) with 200 students in his Art History lecture. This is a coveted class at Vassar, taught by rotating members of the art department ... each lectures on their specific field of expertise. Many classes involve a trip to the Vassar art museum which houses Picassos, Miros, and the like. The other day my son mentioned that he had "section." </p>
<p>"Section?" I queried. "At Vassar? How's your TA?" as this is the question I routinely ask his sister. </p>
<p>"Mom," he replied. "Remember ... there are no TAs at Vassar. My section is led by the chair of the department."</p>
<p>That being said, I would recommend Vassar to anyone seeking a quality education in a heartbeat.</p>
<p>I will say, however, that Harvard offers incredible learning opportunities in another fashion ... there is much more diversity at Harvard ... so much to learn from one's peers.</p>
<p>Odyssey: Your son can approach a seminar professor and try to get into the class if he is truly enthusiastic about it. Last year a "capped class" professor let my daughter in to a seminar. (And it was wonderful.)</p>
<p>I'm a sophomore at Princeton, and so far, the only class that I've had that has been taught by a TA is Calculus 2. I learned that this is a unique phenomenon to the Math department, the faculty of which I never liked anyway. </p>
<p>The rest of my classes have been great, all taught by experienced professors. My Cellular Physiology class lecture was given jointly between a senior biology professor and Shirley Tilghman, our school president. Despite it being a big lecture, I really enjoyed my class. TAs do run the lab sections, but the professor in charge of the lab sections was always present and answering questions. </p>
<p>My freshman and writing seminars were both 12 students or less, and my freshman seminar teacher is a top Japanese history scholar and translator who was Emperor Akihito's English tutor! He was an astoundingly interesting guy.</p>
<p>
[quote]
At Vassar, the classes are small, the professors know every kid and care. In addition, the professors (and advisors) are outstanding; many are Harvard, Princeton, etc. graduates. Basically, it's the same pool of professors who apply to teach at most of these schools.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't think the "same pool " of candidates apply for professorships at LACs and research universities. A LAC professorship and a tenure-track research university faculty position are actually two very different jobs that should attract candidates with different profiles.</p>
<p>For a young, ambitious PhD who has just graduated and wishes to pursue a life-long career in research, a LAC job is probably a career killer: due to the lack of a steady supply of graduate students and proper research funding and facilities at LACs, there is no way he/she could stay competitive with his/her counterparts in large universities in terms of scholarly productivity, especially in hard sciences and engineering. People who apply for LAC jobs are generally individuals who value teaching over a research career and, most of the time, look forward to settling for a "quieter life".</p>
<p>Perhaps a career killer for a scientist, who needs labs, grad students, post docs, and the whole university research establishment. For a humanist, who needs access to a library, and interlibrary loan is fine, and time to think and write, an LAC could be a good place to build a scholarly reputation. Social scientists are in the middle, depending on how much infrastructure they need.</p>
<p>Introductory science and technical courses do not benefit much, if at all, from full professors vs grad students leading sections. It just does not matter at that level. It is more important to have someone who can speak English, which is not taken for granted today.</p>
<p>as twinmom states above most of the Vasser prof went to princeton etc, what does that imply? Perhaps an undergraduate education at HPY or similiar is really special because of world famous profs, extremely unique students and the complete experience. I would not be surprised if a student was accepted at HYP almost all would attend over any LAC.</p>
<p>It's fine for you LAC-buffs who don't want huge classes or TA's teaching your kids -- but there are advantages to being at a university with graduate students and graduate level course offerings as well. </p>
<p>My d. is, I guess, at half an Ivy. She has a Barnard friend who took a graduate level course at Columbia last spring (as a freshman) and recommended it, so my d. will probably take the same course next spring (as a sophomore) -- one of the thing that amazed me is that Columbia course registration is so open. My d. hopes to apply to a specialized 5-year degree program at Columbia- if she gets into it, her last year at Barnard will involve the first year of work on her Master's. She simply wouldn't have these opportunities if she wasn't at a campus with strong graduate programs. </p>
<p>So far her class size has ranged from 6 (Russian class, taught by TA) - to well over 300 (taught by full prof, with TA's grading papers and leading discussion sections). She also has an independent study -- I don't know who she works with on that. </p>
<p>I don't think one environment is better than another, but I think in terms of what my daughter wants --the larger university environment offers the sort of opportunities that she is looking for.</p>
<p>Well, exactly, Calmom. This could be a fascinating discussion of different kinds of learning experiences, but as i said above, it too easily lapsed (like always) into a "my kind of learning is better than yours" campaign. Like it always does.</p>
<p>As I've said before, I went to a large "public Ivy" University, my D went to a highly esteemed LAC, my S is at an Ivy. We all got or are getting fantastic educations, each what suited each of us best.</p>
<p>I would just once love to see this conversation not become--what's wrong with your school (or your kid's school.) Just once.</p>
<p>When I leave Vassar after visiting my child, I always say to myself, "What can be better than this?"</p>
<p>When I leave Harvard after visiting my other child, I always say to myself, "Can it get any better than this?"</p>
<p>Both are great. It's important to find the right fit for your child. That being said, I'm sure my Vassar child would have been happy at Brown and my Harvard child would have been happy at Wesleyan. We visited lots of schools and they both knew which ones they didn't like. It had nothing to do with universities or LACs for them.</p>
<p>Neither school is perfect, by the way. What is?</p>
<p>In the humanities and social sciences, it is indeed the same pool of candidates that apply to both LACs and universities. They can't be choosy about which is which.
Universities regularly hire faculty away from LACs as well.
The internet has made research by LAC profs easier. It used to be that one big drawback of LACs was lack of access to first-rate libraries, especially in specialized areas. Libraries have cut drastically on their book purchases, but the internet makes it easier to check out what others have and to borrow from them; as well, many periodicals are now available online.
Young profs starting off on their career are under as much pressure to publish whether at LACs or at universities. The time-frame for review is the same One assistant prof I know was denied tenure at a LAC despite rave reviews of her teaching because she lacked publications.
Once a prof has received tenure, s/he can be more relaxed about publishing; but that is again the same at both universities and LACs. The two exceptions are Harvard and Yale which only grant tenure at the full professor level, thus keeping up the pressure to publish longer. For other profs, who are tenured (or out of the door) after 8 year at the associate professor level, the pressure to publish is mostly internal. Academics do enjoy research and writing besides teaching.</p>
<p>Whats wrong with TA's? TA's can be just as good or better than the prof. The material isn't so complicated that you always need a prof. to teach it. And sometimes due to the length of time they have dealt with the information they have a harder time understanding why you don't get something. I haven't had a lot of TA's but in my experience my education wasn't marred because they were teaching me and not the prof.</p>
<p>My son is at Brown and has Profs for all his classes - I think he has a TA for his lab or discussion section but I'm not sure. I just looked up his classes (since he doesn't actually tell us anything) and saw his Chem class has 151 kids, with 17 in his lab; 10 kids in a religion class, 100 in another class. His largest class is the very popular Intro to Neuroscience with 388 students. I'd say class size is a non issue for him. A passionate professor with interesting subject matter is more important. He enjoyed the "shopping" period at Brown and couldn't fit in a couple other classes he found interesting (one had 7 students, the other almost 200).</p>
<p>He took classes at a local college and 2 physics classes at Columbia while in HS. Some classes were small, the Columbia ones larger. The only one he didn't like had less to do with the prof or class size; it was too "engineering" based and he lost interest.</p>
<p>My DD, on the other hand, is at Rochester Institute of Technology and has had very small classes. 1st yr classes were around 17, maybe one in the mid 20s. I seem to remember one large lecture lst yr having around 50. At RIT, even the Calc sessions are capped at 20 students and are taught by profs. For her, class size is important. </p>
<p>Another issue is having classes taught in understandable English. At U Delaware, I had too many professors who spoke broken English, making lectures very difficult fo follow. THe TAs in all my Science classes were even worse. I was very thankful I had had difficult science and Calculus classes in HS because I would have never learned the material in those classes. My brother had a similar experience at Rutgers.</p>
<p>"Whats wrong with TA's? TA's can be just as good or better than the prof."</p>
<p>If having lots of TAs was the selling point for prestige colleges, they'd be featured on the home pages of their websites. </p>
<p>They might even make it the slogan on their viewbooks: "Harprinyale - You Might Like Our Professors, But You'll LOVE Our TAs." ;)</p>
<p>(Too bad they don't make public the academic rankings in the COFHE survey - we know where H. ranks, but the rest hold the data pretty close to the vest.)</p>