The letter from our department chair is the document that officially offers you the position of teaching assistant in the English department at the University of Idaho for 2002-2003.  I’d like to give you a little more information about what teaching assistants actually do.  We hope that you decide to accept this position.  Before you do so, though, we would like for you to know in more detail what the position requires you to do.

Teaching assistants (TAs) are both graduate students pursuing their degrees and employees of the university.  TAships are designed to provide you with some financial support while taking your courses, and they are also the means by which we staff a large number (although not all) of our first-year writing courses.

First, a word about your title of this position.  All graduate students at the University of Idaho who get paid for teaching are called teaching assistants (TAs), even when they teach their own classes.  In the English department, all of our TAs teach their own classes (under the overall supervision of the Director of Writing).  You are not “assisting” another instructor in our department.

Here are the basic requirements of your position:

·        Teaching Load: Our heaviest load for teaching introductory composition has usually been in the fall, so we have normally required TAs to teach two sections in the fall and one in the spring.  Most sections of English 101 will have 27 students at the start of the semester, but we will also allow some students to exit the course at midterm.  This will result in sections with a fewer than 25 students for the second half of the semester.  English 102 sections will  have 26 students at the start of the semester.

·        TA Workshop: You must participate in a TA workshop during the week before classes begin, August 19 through August 23.  We will meet from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm with an hour for lunch.  The returning TAs will also be attending this workshop.

·        Courses for Professional Development:  The TAship also requires you to take graduate classes in composition and rhetoric that provide you with a practical and theoretical basis for your teaching.  English 505 and 506 together count for six credits in your graduate program.

The first, English 505, Writing Workshop for Teachers, is a practical course.  This course is graded P/F.  In that class we will be able to review the week that has just passed and get plans for the week to come.  The course also includes a light introduction to composition theory.  In the spring semester, you are required to take English 506, Language and the Teaching of Writing, which is an introduction and survey of composition theory and rhetoric.  This is a more conventional graduate class that asks you to study, think about, and especially write about the field of composition studies from the prospective of your own specialty.  It is graded A-F.

If you have already been a TA at another institution and have taken courses like this, it is possible to receive credit for English 506, but you are still required to take English 505.

·        Staff Meetings:  After your first semester, you must attend staff meetings that are usually organized according to the course that you are teaching.  Thus, English 101 teachers usually have their own set of meetings (English 505 serves this purpose in the fall for new teachers); the English 102 teachers have other meetings.  Occasionally, all TAs need to attend other sorts of meetings.  These meetings usually occur just once a month, but they can be as often as bi-weekly.

·        Class Evaluations:  All classes are evaluated by the students at the end of each semester.  In addition, as Director of Writing, I will visit your class at least once during your first semester of teaching and sometime during your second year as well.

In your first semester of teaching, you will be dealing with students taking English 101, Introduction to College Writing.  They are fresh (meaning they have never written at a college level), and you will find them extremely teachable.  We will try to make teaching assignments as soon as possible (probably during the early summer).  You will also be able to get a copy of the textbook that will be required in English 101 in the summer well before classes start.

During the TA Workshop in the week before classes start in the fall, you get oriented to our writing program and to the teaching of writing in general.  You will learn about the various academic support services that are available for your students (the Writing Center, the Teaching and Academic Assistance Center, Student Support Services, etc.) and some information about academic policies and procedures.  We also assign offices and get everyone familiar with the office machinery and the secretaries.  You can also get a computer e-mail account and learn a bit about the computer labs on campus and in our department.  Most important, however, we will discuss what students do during their first-year writing courses at the University of Idaho, why they do it, and how you teach them to do it.

The TAs generally form a cohesive group.  The TAs all share an office with two others.  You will have your own desk and a place for books.  The TA offices are in Brink Hall (very close to the library), the building that houses the rest of the English department, and they are almost all on the same hallway.  Many of the TAs use their offices for their own studying.

The TAship has many advantages for your graduate student life.  From a practical perspective, it gives you a place on campus from which to operate and provides you with a group of people who are likely to become your close acquaintances and even your friends.  From a professional prospective, the TA gives you teaching experience, which is one of the most valuable practical skills that you can get with an MA in English or TESL or an MFA degree.