<p>D has been very fortunate to have recieved full funding for a master's program in applied economics (full tuition remission, medical care, etc.) She knows she does not want to go the Ph.D. route, although the school asked her to consider it. But officially so far, and in her heart quite certainly, she intends to do just the master's. </p>
<p>The intial offer, made last spring, gave her a 10-hour/week grad assistantship with a modest stiped. Last week she was approached by the econ department and told that there is a late opening for another TA in the math department for an intro lab in stats -- would she be interested? The math department often uses econ grad students as TAs, since they need so many and the econ grad students are generally reasonably strong in math. The TA-ship would be 20 hours/week as opposed to 10, with a doubling of the modest stipend. Yeah, she can upgrade -- from ramen noodles to pasta a few times a week. ;)</p>
<p>D does not* love* math as pure math people do, but is "good enough" at it to do what she needs to for her purposes. She was at first thinking that she would perhaps be better off sticking with the assistantship -- fewer hours, less pressure for her first semester back as a student. (She worked for three years in her field between undergrad and grad school.) But now she is thinking that the TA-ship might be more of a growth opportunity. The modest extra money would be nice but will not be the deciding factor, since she has a cushion from having worked these years. H and I advised her to do whichever would lead to her making the most of her grad school experience.</p>
<p>Opinions/feedback on being a TA as opposed to a grad assistant? Thanks!</p>
<p>First, mucho congrats on your D’s acceptance into the program with full tuition!!! Wow. </p>
<p>I think the one issue she is debating is the amount of time and how that will be in terms of balancing her own schoolwork for her degree program…and that is a wise consideration. Is there any way she can be put in touch with other Masters students in this program from the past to get a handle on the workload and their thoughts as to working ten vs. twenty hours per week? They would know. She also could ask any who have been TAs as well from her department. </p>
<p>My D was a TA for a course as a senior in college and loved it and was able to handle it. She thought maybe she would do this in grad school and also the money would be helpful. In her particular grad program, architecture, now that she has finished the first year, she realizes that no way could she ever fit being a TA in. In her program, most days she has classes ALL day and she then lives in the studio ALL night and ALL weekend. What were we thinking?? LOL And so that is why I think it would be wise to ask someone who has been in the department for a full year at least to know what the hours are involved just as a student and what they think of fitting in a 20 hour TA position. I think those are the people who might know the best.</p>
<p>One last thing…is her program one or two years? IF it is two years, she could just do the ten hour position this coming year and then think about the 20 position the second year after knowing more what it will be like in her program.</p>
<p>^ Thanks for the response, Soozievt, good point. Yes, she has spoken to three people at her firm who have done the same program she is entering. She says they told her that their experience was that the grad assistants end up doing more than 10 hours/week and the TAs actually end up doing somewhat less than 20, so they felt that being a TA was the better “deal.” BUT the grad assistantship would probably be more flexible – grading papers could be done anytime, whereas the TA lab schedule would be fixed. </p>
<p>H and I are stressing that the decision should not be made on finances – maximizing how she uses her time in grad school, and doing well in her program, should be the main consideration. I know that is how your very focused D is. But unlike your D, mine will not have studio time demands. Plus she says she thinks that TA-ing a stats class might strengthen her own skills. I wish she had known about this earlier in the summer as it has been years since she took this class herself, so she would have to refresh. She has asked for a copy of the syllabus. She will herself be taking a higher level math class required of all econ grad students, and has prepped for that over the summer. Had she known she would be doing this, she would have left her job a week or so earlier. She is working until a week before grad school starts (wants to maximize her nest egg before becoming a poor grad student).</p>
<p>edited to add:
Her program should be one and a half years. She will have a long thesis which she plans to do next summer, and then her last semester of classes, to finish in January 2011. And yeah, if she were not a TA this first semester she would likely have the opportunity to be one later on.</p>
<p>Your D should find out what the responsibilities entail. I assume that she will be required to attend all the lectures: they may or may not clash with her own. She probably will be required to lead a section. In math, this usually means going over the materials and answering questions about problem sets. She will be expected to grade the problem sets of the students in the section. It would be useful to know how many students per section, since it will affect the number of psets to be graded. Chances are that she will be required to meet once a week with the prof and the other TAs. </p>
<p>If teaching is not a goal, and since she does not need the money, she may want to decline the opportunity. But if there is a possibility that she will go for the Ph.D., she should look into the different requirements for first and second year MA. Will she have a thesis to write next year? Is changing her mind a possibility, in which case she will have to think about Ph.D. qualifying exams. The need for TAs in math is a perennial problem everywhere, so the opportunity to be a math TA will still be there next year.</p>
<p>EDIT: I see that she would be expected to hold an intro lab. I don’t know what that involves specifically.
S was undergraduate course assistant for an advanced course he’d never taken. all he had were the lecture notes from the prof which he had a chance to read over the summer. It went quite well and S got praise from students.:)</p>
<p>OK, glad she asked and knew others who had been there, done that! It sounds like the difference in hours between the two is not as significant as it appears and so the difference may be more the structure of the hours and also the money…and of course simply the nature of the experience itself. </p>
<p>Is she going one or two years? Could she try the assistantship first semester and move onto TA for second semester? Or first year, second year…same idea?</p>
<p>I cross posted with Marite but agree that if your D ever wanted to teach down the line, then the TA position would be handy to have under her belt. </p>
<p>I also agree from my D’s experience as a TA in senior year (some TAs were grad students but she was a senior)…it involved attending the lecture, leading two sections (and prepping for that) and attending a weekly meeting with the professor and other TAs. And this was for a course she had already taken herself before and so it will be harder for your D as she must brush up on the content as well. My D loved it but it did involve a lot of time. She enjoys teaching and leading.</p>
<p>Thanks, marite, for your feedback as well. She is quite certain she is not interested in a Ph.D. or an academic career. When she was interviewed for her master’s program the interviewers asked her to consider the Ph.D. option, but she is quite confident that is not what she wants. She has been in consulting for three years and liked it but knows that she has gone as far as she can without a graduate degree, but she can’t imagine herself going to school for six more years, so the master’s will be it. She says she will have a very significant thesis requirement though, and she plans to focus on that next summer. </p>
<p>Good point about the lectures and the schedule. I would hate for her to have to miss any of her own classes to attend lectures for the class she is TA-ing. I will ask her to check this out. She was told it was to lead a stats “lab” section. She has asked how often it meets - just had the initial inquiry the end of last week, so is waiting for responses to her questions.</p>
<p>Thanks SO much for the very helpful feedback.</p>
<p>Congratulations on your daughter’s great options. To the good advice given above, I would add one other point in favor of taking the graduate research assistantship. Much of the learning in a graduate research program takes place one-on-one between professors and graduate students. A research assistantship is not the only way for this learning to happen, but it is a good start. If she will need to do a lengthy thesis, her research assistantship will probably be more helpful in working toward that goal. </p>
<p>Plus, if you’ve ever tried to teach statistics to undergraduates, you would flee from any job that requires you to spend 20 hours a week doing that!</p>
<p>Is it stats to math types or stats to social science/liberal arts types? I think that makes a difference in terms of the demands of office hours, number of special sessions she’ll need to make time for before the midterm, etc. Math types will have enough of the core skills required to make it through the class with guidance but not handholding. Non-math types are likely to suck up all the oxygen in the air. (I was a non-math type. I took stats as an undergrad and needed a moderate amount of handholding since it was a class designed for social science types. I took stats in grad school and needed HUGE amounts of TA time to get through it. Sorry to hijack the thread!)</p>
<p>As we know giving free advice is usually directly proportional to its cost. </p>
<p>So, please take what I will say with a grain of salt. I strongly believe that it is best to maximize the non-committed time during a Master’s program. I would not walk away but run away from the TA position, and this for a number of reasons. Fwiw, and please do not take this the wrong way, but the TA offer exemplifies everything that is *so wrong *with such programs. Having PhD candidates with TA duties is quite different from relying on UG Seniors and Master’s candidates, especially when focusing on pedagogical skills and aptitude versus contents’ mastery.</p>
<p>I believe that the opportunity for personal growth and satisfaction will only be found through the graduate assistantship. Also, I believe that an Econ major would easily compute the different “value” of the free tuition + small stipend compared to the free tuition + double stipend. :)</p>
<p>The reason the OP’s D is in an MA program is solely because she chose to be, as opposed to being uncompetitive with Ph.D. candidates. In many many programs, first year Ph.D. students are expected to be half-time TAs as part of their funding package. And of course, the use of advanced math students as undergraduate course assistant is rampant, even in the LACs where profs supposedly teach everything.
As far as pedagogy is concerned, it really depends on each school. Again, many Ph.D. programs in math expect students who apply to already have some teaching experience (see under undergraduate course assistants), so I suppose there is only a minimal amount of training available to incoming Ph.D. students. Again, this amount varies as does the professorial supervision and guidance of graduate TAs.</p>
<p>That said, it looks like the D would be better off being a research assistant.</p>
<p>Marite, I am afraid you misunderstood my point. I was not addressing the issue of the qualifications of the OP’s daughter, especially in the case of a student who was asked to consider switching from a Master’s to a PhD program. This said, it remains that, in my opinion, asking a Master’s candidate in Economy to teach an advanced math class should raise a few eyebrows. Not about the student, but about the school. After all, is this TA-ship good for the student or only good for the school bottom line? </p>
<p>Of course, this all goes to our individual views on the (ab)use of the TA system.</p>
<p>Thanks so much for all the responses. Great feedback.</p>
<p>For what it is worth, apparently the class is neither higher level nor meant for math majors, but rather an introductory stats class for econ/business types. However, the class is offered by the math department. </p>
<p>The feedback is very helpful, and I hope D considers the points well. She was told that she would need to interview for the spot. (The initial query was along the lines of “Would you be interested in this option?”). Her work schedule is such that she may have to bow out from consideration because of timing. </p>
<p>In any event, I really appreciate alll the points made. I am of the opinion, especially after reading the feedback here, that she should take a pass, at least until the spring semester. But as has always been the case, and as is appropriate, she makes up her own mind. All I can do is offer resources, a great one being CC (where she would never post herself – her loss IMO). ;)</p>
<p>The class would be an intro lab for stats, which I assume to be the equivalent of AP stats, not an advanced class.
For what it’s worth, by the time an undergrad becomes a course assistant, there is a very good chance that s/he will teaching students who are his or her peers. The only time that does not happen is when the classes are of the MV-Calc/LA or below variety.
X-edit with Jyber.</p>
<p>As for whether it’s good for the student or the school, I think the latter, though my S learned a lot from being CA.</p>
<p>S1 was a course assistant for an AP course his senior year of HS, ands in connection with one of his ECs, also taught two lunch periods a week on the same subject area. Is in the process of applying for a math course assistant spot for this fall, even though he missed the news on the application deadline quite a while ago. His role would be to have office hours a couple of times a week to help folks w/psets and reviewing the material – no straight teaching yet. OTOH, he is very interested in teaching math at the college level, so this experience is pretty important to him.</p>
<p>An 18-month Master’s w/thesis sounds pretty intense – I think I’d vote for the grad assistantship and fewer hours, esp. since she is not planning to teach in the future and already has a career track and work experience well in hand.</p>
<p>Another two cents - If you are going to be applying for jobs in the future where your duties include explaining things to people, having had the experience t a ing will be helpful, and employers will recognize that. </p>
<p>She might think about the sort of job she is hoping to get when she is done with the masters and consider which of the two options will give her type of experience that she will be able to talk about during job interviews. I’m sure it could go either way.</p>
<p>Thanks again for all the thoughtful and very helpful responses. I would prefer that D keep things simple and less stressed her first semester in grad school, especially since she has been out of school for three years. But her inclination was to consider this option, and once she let her department know that she was considering it, they signed her up for the TA training program (held thw week before classes start). She still has to interview with the math prof whose TA she would be, and that interview will not even take place until that same week.</p>
<p>So I fear this will be a last-minute decision, and she has no idea if other grad students are being considered for this late spot. She checked out the list of other TAs and they are all Ph.D. students.</p>
<p>D says that one aspect of TA-ing that appeals to her is that it will be more interactive than being a grad assistant, and more people-focused. She has taught some before (English to executives in China) so has some comfort level with that.</p>
<p>Again, I do agree with the many who suggested she consider this for a* later *semester. I also told her that she needs to put her own education first. But she does see this as a personal growth opportunity and I can’t argue with that.</p>
<p>All the feedback has been very helpful and is appreciated, especially by this (approaching retirement) helicopter parent. Thanks so much. :)</p>
<p>Learning about the use of undergrads as teaching/course assistants makes me appreciate the big state U’s with grad students (instead of LAC’s that don’t have them or enough faculty to do the job). I don’t understand how good math PhD programs can expect students to get undergrad teaching experiences at the best schools since those will have grad students to do the job and the students will be busy taking higher level math courses unless they need the money. I’m also used to a U having separate math and statistics depts with some courses perhaps being crosslisted. The things you learn from this website…</p>
<p>I honestly don’t see much difference between the workload of an advanced undergraduate and a new Ph.D. student; in math, a lot of programs require first-year grads to teach as part of their finaid package. I do not see, either, a lot of difference in level of knowledge or maturity between a senior and a first-year graduate student.<br>
The biggest difference? Money. An undergraduate course assistant gets paid about a quarter of what a first-year grad would get, AND does not get the tuition waiver that graduate students get.</p>