<p>Does anyone know, roughly:</p>
<p>1) what proportion of courses at Amherst are taught by Professors (i.e., the Professor lectures every class), vs. taught primarily by graduate students or post-doctoral fellows / lecturers? If it varies by department, I’m most interested in the areas of Political Science and LJST; </p>
<p>2) what a typical class size might be for introductory and advanced courses in these same areas?</p>
<p>Thanks! I know the answers for these questions ca. 1980, but I’m interested in the current answers for a potential new student for the class of 2010.</p>
<p>Considering that Amherst is an undergraduate college, not graduate school, your chances of having a grad student are pretty nil. However, as at Oxford, and some of the European Universities, Amherst does have some grad students, etc., that serve as tutors outside of class, especially in the foreign languages. There are reciprocal agreements with some of the European Universities for this. As to other subjects, maybe someone else can tell you better. All I know is that D has had no one but profs in any of her classes, and tutors in the foreign language classes, with tutorials strongly encouraged, but not mandatory. Most students in those classes avail themselves of the services.</p>
<p>D's largest class was the intro Econ class. It had around 100 she said. One of her foreign language classes this semester has 6. I sat in on a couple of her classes at Parent's Weekend, and the Spanish class was the largest - it had around 18 or so. As to who teaches the classes, the Pres even teaches in the Poli Sci area.</p>
<p>Did some quick checking for you. US News and World Report shows that in 2004 71% of the classes were under 20. 4% were 50 or more. 95% of the faculty are full-time. Student/faculty ratio 8/1. Hope this helps.</p>
<p>Thanks - that's very helpful!</p>
<p>All classes are taught by profs with TA sessions with advanced students or, as evitajr1 said, with foreign language exchange students brought for one year through a demanding program from a few European Universities. I think that the average class size is about 20 students. My largest class this semester is 30 students and my smallest is 6. The other two have less than 20. Intro science/econ/psych/philosophy classes are going to be large. My intro to econ class was 125 students 2 days a week taught by 3 professors, and 1 day with 25 students and 1 professor to clarify/review, etc.</p>
<p>I should add that very few classes have TA sessions.</p>