Long story but my son is in a class where the TA has broken FERPA laws in regard to him. It is all well documented on the computer with another student. How likely is it that he will be pulled from the classroom if my son goes to the Dean with this info? He feels his grade is being hurt by this TA and is thinking of taking a Pass/Fail now in this class.
Have your son go to the Dean of Students. That is a serious offense.
^ We haven’t been told what the offense is, so we don’t know if it is a serious offense. Violating FERPA could involve letting students themselves pick up their graded homework assignments that are all sitting in a box in the TA office. Or perhaps a TA posts the grades outside his or her the door without student names but in alphabetical order. Or maybe the TA congratulates a student in class for getting a 100 on the exam.
The first thing to do if you have concerns about a TA is to go to the professor and suggest that the TA needs some reminders of what is expected regarding student privacy.
Was the student harmed by this violation and has the TA been warned about this in the past? If so, then maybe the TA needs to be prevented from TAing again.
TAs are usually getting funding for their PhD living expenses by teaching. I suspect that there would be an investigation of the issue, but the TA would likely at least finish the semester. I agree that your son should still make a complaint. But he is likely to still have to finish the semester with this TA.
“maybe the TA congratulates a student in class for getting a 100 on the exam.”
Is this really an offense? I took a class at another university a couple years ago and the professor always told everyone who had the highest score and what it was.
^
Technically, yes, but often done. The reason it’s an “offense” is that by mentioning who got the highest grade - say 100 - then by default the prof is saying that everyone else didn’t get 100.
The same has been argued about NMF, honor roll, and other similar achievement announcements, etc.
BTW…I don’t agree with all of this, but that’s been the argument.
Clarification: It’s actually an offense (not an “offense”) not because the instructor said nobody else got a 100%, it’s that the instructor divulged a student’s grade without the explicit written permission of that student.
It’s unlikely to get more than a hand-slap, particularly if it’s an individual assignment rather than a final grade, but it’s still a FERPA issue, and therefore a violation of federal law.
Sorry for getting back on here so late but thanks for the advice. This has involved Facebook messages to my son’s roommate about what he has written in papers and inappropriate things regarding girls and my son in the class. Prof is on maternity leave and now his agenda is being pushed which seems to me to have zero to do with the class topic. His sister has urged him to go to the Dean just on what he is saying in class to the students but I know he is concerned about what could potentially happen to his grade. I believe the reasoning for taking the class Pass/Fail now is because his sister has told him this TA is probably going to grade him harshly when he’s mocking him on Facebook.
I suppose with the semester this close to the end he should go to the Dean after the last class so that this yahoo is not put in front of students next semester.
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Teaching assignments for spring TAs, if not already made, are at the very least in the process of being made right now. The longer it takes to bring this to the attention of whoever does the scheduling, the more distress it’s going to cause at that level—and, quite honestly, if one waits until after one’s received a low grade, it may well get viewed as sour grapes and be effectively ignored out of hand.
Also, @riverbirch, I got all tangled up in the pronouns in your update—couldn’t tell who was who.
Depends on the nature of the comments in class – but one of my kids complained to the Dean of Faculty about mysoginist/explicit jokes told in lecture by a prof (repeatedly). My kid was not identified to the prof, and the jokes stopped. But there was no apparent penalty for the prof. And maybe worth noting that when she had the same prof for a required (smaller) class later on, he had started up again with the same behavior. She didn’t feel she could complain then without him figuring out who it was, and she was worried about her grade. So she did not complain.
sorry talking on the phone while I was typing. I agree but the Facebook posts happened just before Thanksgiving break so no concrete evidence before that time period. It is of no concern to my son what kind of distress in scheduling this is going to cause. I highly doubt they can ignore Facebook messages sent from a TA regarding a student in the TA’s class.
I would get those messages screen saved/printed out. The problem is that the TA is going to know who reported the complaint. Hopefully your son won’t have to have this TA again.