Coordinators and Teaching Assistants / Fellows, 5, 6, and 7

[Natalia Pylypiuk]

Hello, again!  Inasmuch as not everyone responded to the additional, 
three questions, I will identify the respondents merely as A, B and C.
             Cheers,  Natalia Pylypiuk
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> (Question 5)  Do you, as coordinator, have the right to reject a 
> graduate student being appointed to you, if you deem that the 
> individual is not committed to teaching?

A-- This issue has (thankfully) not come up yet.  If a graduate student 
were really a bad teacher and not interested in improving, I think that 
[the coordinator] could put [a] foot down and refuse that they be 
allowed to teach language.  I don't know if [such] insistence could 
prevent that student from being used as a TA for a non-language class 
[under the jurisdiction of a colleague other than the coordinator.

B-- [ the] coordinator is on the committee that selects TA's and RA's, 
once the committee assigns a task and the Chair approves it, the list 
is put to a confirmation vote by the department.

C-- We have never had that problem, all the decisions having been based 
on consensus. If [the coordinator] said a TA didn't have the language 
proficiency to teach [Slavic language] it would be heeded (we've never 
had that issue come up, although [the coordinator has] stipulated in 
the past that a TA not be assigned to a language level for which s/he 
was not qualified).


> (Question 6)  Do you conduct interviews with prospective graduate 
> students before making decisions on appointments?

A-- [...] the answer is "Not always".  [The coordinator] highly 
encourages students to visit campus (and the campuses of all of their 
prospective grad schools).  Unfortunately, only about half of the 
serious contenders actually do.  This gives [...] us the chance to get 
to know the student, and during [such] interviews and talks with them, 
[the coordinator] probes about teaching (interest and preparation). 
 [My alma mater] used to have (I don't know if it still does) a 
formalized "Prospective Grad Student Weekend" where students were 
brought to campus, housed and fed, shown the campus, interviewed by 
faculty, and met with current grad students.  [...] [the coordinator] 
would like to institute something similar here at [our] University 
(when the budget gets better).

B-- Where possible we do, mostly to validate language proficiency 
claims.

C-- [The language coordinator has] interviewed them for language 
proficiency.


> (Question 7)  Is language teaching viewed in your department as an 
> intellectual activity requiring the skills of a well trained 
> professional, or primarily as a means of financial support?

B-- Yes, but over the years there have been individuals who look at 
language teaching as a lesser occupation. By and large we still ask all 
faculty to teach some language from time to time, it keeps them aware 
of the challenge and where their bread and butter come from!

C-- Somewhere in between, [one] suspects. One positive thing is that 
the amount of time/labor teaching requires is certainly respected, and 
there is a wariness of OVERloading TAs that is actually nice to see. 
[The coordinator is] not sure there's really awareness among colleagues 
who do not teach language of the intellectual issues involved (and I 
know that they have not done reading in SLA and pedagogy, but [one] 
would not expect that). Conversations [the coordinator has] had suggest 
they see language teaching as something time-consuming and in that 
sense onerous, something that requires respect for that reason, but not 
something you could call an "intellectual activity."

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