Also ask the TA for a rubric. Ask what can be improved. See if they have an example paper that would be an A. Go to the Writing Center to calibrate…is this a C paper? Then go to the Prof and try to find out what are the characteristics of an A paper vs. a C paper.
There are terrible TAs. There may also be a jump in the level of writing needed by your son.
Even great writers phone it in occasionally. Jane Austen and JD Salinger may be the only literary geniuses who don’t have some clunkers (because their production was so small relative to other writers).
It doesn’t matter if your son’s paper was brilliant or terrible. What’s important is that he’s got an opportunity to learn how to lift his game. Some of the greatest writers in history (journalists, non-fiction, fiction) credit their editors for the quality of their published work and fully admit that they had to take their “baby” and torture it with professional help.
Encourage your son to read through the websites of Yaddo, McDougal, Iowa writing program. Brilliant writers attend these places and subject themselves to withering criticism by their peers to learn to write better.
Your son is lucky- a TA who likely realizes that your son is a strong and capable writer, and with help, can become a superlative writer. If it were me I’d be encouraging him to see this as a fantastic opportunity. And now that he’s off to a great start in college, he can push the re-start button on his education, put his HS accolades and awards behind me, and get going on his college education. Learning to see a disappointing grade as an opportunity and not a catastrophe is an important part of college.
I’m with Blossom here. My psych prof gave me my first D ever on first draft of honors thesis. She told me what she expected, and I rewrote, and restructured, over winter break. (Not much of a break.) when it was finally done, I had an A. This prof worked usually with grad students, and 2 became college presidents. Another became a prof at a different U, and my future adviser. I felt we all learned from the best. Eventually, my P HD thesis was published, following the same structure that I learned as an UG.
I’ve never heard of a TA in first year grad school. I reviewed some of my work with my adviser, , and she told me to back off from correcting grammar, as we were not the English department. My son was a TA in second and third year at grad school, but always with a partner.
So your son called home to tell you that he is one of two students getting an A. For his mental health, try to redirect this focus to what interests him in the class, that kind of thing.
Freefloating intelligence is really of no use to anyone else. If he has abilities, rather than focus on awards and grades, focus on what he can do with his talents, how he can be of service, what strong interests can blossom. I personally thing that being useful is the most important thing in life.
My son worked his butt off for a B+ in expository writing his freshman year at Harvard…he got an 800 in the SAT writing, but that really doesn’t mean much, frankly. His TF - teaching fellow (same as a TA) was tough and demanding. He had to figure out what she was looking for…and it very much seemed that she was much more interested in what he said, rather than how he said it. Does that make sense? I think precocious high schoolers can dazzle with a turn of a phrase and fancy vocabulary, but that often won’t cut it in college, where the focus is on concise language and making a clear and logical argument. Your son should listen closely to the TA and try to understand the areas for improvement. It is the beginning of the term, so presumably he has time to improve…it could also be that his TA wants to leave margin for improvement and is not giving any As this early on.
Something blossom said reminded me of the “Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten” line of thinking. When my younger D was in kindergarten she was clearly the brightest kid in the class, and most days when I’d show up early, the teacher was reminding the others to back away from D’s desk where they had lined up to ask for her help. But every paper she brought home said “You can do better” for the first part of the year, with corrections shown throughout. Had we not seen examples of her work vs. others, we’d have been very concerned.
But you know what? The teacher was right. There WERE things D could do better. As good as she was, she had room for improvement. She started paying closer attention to her work and papers started coming home with, “THIS is good work!” and “You did well!”
OP, please don’t scoff about your story not being about kindergarten. Blossom is right-your son is being handed a gift-to learn ways to “do better”. Her attempt to “do better” in kindergarten has stayed with D all these years. It doesn’t matter if you’re 5 or 25-one can always “do better”, even with a trail of A’s and awards behind them.
I am a bit surprised at the snippy comments on here. Maybe the fact that this essay counts for a third of his grade in this class and the stress of maintaining a high GPA for his scholarship is weighing on him and me as well. If he should lose his scholarship he would have to come home and we would have to figure something else out. When you have worked your whole life to get into college it is important. My son was not valedictorian or even salutatorian of his senior class. He was in the top ten. He and I am proud that he won a scholarship to a large university. He is the first person in my immediate family to do so. He had never asked for a grade adjustment in his life. A bit of a shock to know someone who is not a teacher or professor; actually this is her very first job; could cost someone their scholarship. She did provide a rubric and it makes no sense. She contradicts herself and the prompt.
I’m sorry that you and your son are having this problem. I would feel quite stressed by it, also. My take on the situation is that although what the TA is doing might or might not be fair, your son has to figure out an approach most likely to get the result he wants, which is a better grade, and so he has to work with this TA in a diplomatic way. Good luck.
These aren’t snippy comments - did you come here for advice or commiseration?
You are getting good advice. The first thing you need to do is abandon the idea that the TA is “costing” your son anything and switch you point of view to what is your son earning - in this class, on each paper - not what did he earn last semester, not what did he earn to get here - what did he earn in this class - so far it is a C. That is what the professor, through his TA, has decided.
Your son can continue to blame the TA, or he can figure out how to get a better grade. The more your son blames the TA, the harder it will be for your son to accept that he needs to change something about how he approaches this class.
You can be pretty sure the professor is well aware of what the grades were on the assignment. Either, the grades are lower that the professor wants, in which case he will adjust accordingly later and future assignments won’t be grades as harshly, or, the TA is doing as instructed and the students will either have to improve their work or continue getting their C’s.
Final, step back and let go! - one bad grade is not going to cost anyone a scholarship. Certainly not a C on one paper, less than 1/3 of the way through the semester. College students are expected to get B’s and C’s, it is part of the process.
^^op, part of the problem is that you have repeatedly made this TA out to be an absolute nothing who should be humbled by the mere presence of your son in her class, not even needing to read his papers in order to humbly affix an A to each of them. You have put her down over and over, while regaling your son’s achievements. It comes across like someone shouting “do you know who I AM?” and wanting special treatment. You implied that his NMS status should “mean something” to her (so she would know how to read his essays?), but in 20 years of being a TA, an adjunct, and a NTT lecturer I have never recieved dossiers on my students and with few exceptions have no idea about their SAT scores, scholarship status, or history awards. And it wouldn’t matter if I did - either they can do the work or they can’t.
You are putting this TA down but do you know anything about HER SAT scores? Her GPA? Her comments from respected professors? At the very least she is 4 years ahead of your son in this process and has been accepted to grad school and appointed a TA, and she deserves some respect for that. If your son shares your opinion of her worth as an instructor, he should drop the course, since there is nothing he can learn there - and isn’t learning something the point, in the end?
My daughter is a terrible writer and admits it. She doesn’t like it, doesn’t work at it, doesn’t have a good command of words. She received a 10 on the ACT writing test I think for 2 reasons. First, she is very direct, very to the point. Nothing flowery. Short sentences. Second, she has beautiful handwriting so her work looks nice. I think the grader was so tired of reading ‘SAT words’ written in chicken scratch that he rewarded ‘short, sweet and neat.’
He’s got time to work on bringing up his grade. He’s going to talk to the TA, and then can move on to the Prof. However, arguing he always gets A’s, that he’s won writing awards, will not help his case. He needs to look at his work realistically, see how he can change it, take redirection. He might get a B. My daughter also needs to maintain a certain GPA to keep her scholarship. It’s a pressure cooker, but she knows she might get a B in some things so does her best and the knows she need an A in other classes. That’s just college. You son needs to consider this when building his schedule and make sure to take some classes he’s sure about and then balancing these other classes which might be harder with those.
In academia (and outside of it), there’s tremendous value in learning that not everyone will like your work and you won’t succeed every time. I’m probably what a lot of people would consider an “objectively” good writer (I’ve published over 20 journal articles as well as short story), been paid to edit grant applications, etc., but I’ve definitely run into people who, for whatever reason, didn’t like my writing, edited the hell out of my writing, etc. In fact, it’s common to see everyone on paper essentially massacre it–PhDs, MDs, undergrad, etc. It’s never fun receiving criticism–and I balk when people try to imply it is–but it’s part of life and part of work and education, and you have to learn to roll with the punches, even when they suck or seem unfair or stupid. Sometimes, you feel great about a journal article, and it gets rejected. Sometimes, you even go on to publish it in a better journal than the one that rejected it. Other times, it gets file drawer’ed. Sometimes, you get completely contradictory reviews. Sometimes, you get good reviews, but the editor rejects it anyway. That’s all life, for better or worse.
I don’t think he is lucky, nor that the TA realizes anything thoughtful. Sometimes you get an uninformed TA who doesn’t know how to grade. I hope that with the at least several complaints, the professor will step in.
Some have reported their kids attending LACs being offered (as undergraduates) TA jobs, although in some cases, the TA duties may be less than TA duties in other schools.
Interesting… it seems that in some big research universities, most departments offer and require first time TAs to enroll in a “how to teach” type of course/seminar (specific to the department).
Gosh, sseamom, I get the message of your story but feel sad to read about papers in kindergarten! And when kids show different levels of skill at that age, it is really not predictive. When my kids were in kindergarten the developmental model prevailed. In fact, my son like many gifted people, actually learned to read later than some of his classmates.
Sorry for the tangent.
Oh, don’t feel bad, compmom! DD and a couple of other kids had actually tested into K early-they came in reading, doing work beyond the other kids-Ms. F held them to a standard of what she knew they could do. She is probably the only teacher I’ve seen excel at true differentiation-and every single kid finished that year ahead of where they started. Contrast to 2 years later when DD was bored and doing halfdone work and her teacher just assumed that’s all she could manage. It’s all about expectations.
If one C is going to cost your son either his ego or his scholarship, you’ve got bigger problems than this TA.
The biggest gift you can give your son is to encourage him to listen to feedback. Not just “gosh you’re a brilliant writer” but actual redline editing. If he writes like James Joyce and this TA is encouraging him to write like Hemingway, that’s a valuable lesson. Sometimes a brilliant writer needs short, punchy sentences with short declarative words.
All I’m hearing is that the TA is a moron and that your son is too gifted to get feedback that doesn’t start with “Wow”. So perhaps your son could begin all over again. Perhaps with the mindset that the TA is trying to help (which I’m pretty sure is the case) and not sabotage. What possible motivation would a TA have for wanting to torpedo your kid and have him lose his scholarship? And does his scholarship require that every single paper get an A for four years?
That’s one weird scholarship.
My personal opinion, your son will do better if he tries to work with the TA rather than just going over her head and complaining about her. The TA may be unqualified and she may be grading in a fashion that’s contradictory, but your son is stuck with her. Seems like the best course of action is to figure out what she wants in an essay. This means going to speak to her during her office hours and asking lots of questions.
Your son should ask if the TA would be willing to read a draft of the next essay before it’s due and give your son feedback. If he shows that he wants to learn from her and is willing to listen, he should be able to figure out what he needs to do to get a higher grade.
Life is full of difficult people/situations and our kids need to figure out how to deal with them.
Hear! Hear!
There is really not much else to do. In a four to six years undergraduate education, it is a given that one will meet his or share of poor TAs and poor instructors. And perhaps a few (rare) great ones. We could spend another decade debating the role of TAs in education, and we will be none the wiser. The posters who happen to have kids or have been TAs themselves will rarely understand why some others might consider the practice of allowing TAs to GRADE papers is truly abominable. Grading a calculus with an answer sheet is one thing; grading a verbal paper … that is different! And that is the way it has been on CC from the day I joined. It is what it is!
The biggest issue is that it is very difficult to avoid the TAs from hell. The only solution is to work around the problem and accept a lower grade.
As someone who has been a TA…
Some TA’s are incompetent, and many grade much more harshly than full profs (since they haven’t learned to go along with grade inflation yet). TAs might actually stick to the published grade descriptions, which usually have C as ‘basic competence’ etc, rather than the real grade descriptions which everyone knows, which will put a basic competent paper at something like a B+ or A-.
But many undergraduates have coasted on their ability to write superficially well, and seem to regard college courses as a chance to show off their skills rather than to actually learn new material and skills. I’m sensing a bit of this attitude in you. Who is to say that there wasn’t a lot of new material and skill in this course which your kid just didn’t really demonstrate well?
As for petty high school awards… come off it. For the record, good teaching practice is to grade anonymously.