Support for Faculty Working with TAs in Remote Instruction

• Updating Course Materials
  • Clearly communicate any changes to content, assignments, or expectations with your TAs and make sure you are on the same page before sharing this material with undergrads to minimize confusion.
• Maintain Class Canvas Page
  • Connect your TA to Canvas resources and workshops to troubleshoot any issues or questions you have with Canvas. There are offices on campus that specialize in instructional technology tools and software, like Canvas. 

• Communicate with Students
  • Having consistent, regular communication is essential in time of transition. Coordinate when you and/or your TA will communicate your class, so that students can expect regular updates but will not get inundated with emails.
• Hold Office Hours
  • To manage your time and be efficient, communicate to your students how in and in what ways you will be in touch. If TAs are offering Zoom office hours, can you suggest they make these available in blocks for several students, rather than one-on-ones? To reduce the number of repeated questions, TAs might create a Google Doc for students to write specific questions and you and the TA can answer them within the document. It’s a convenient, one-stop place for students to access answers to common questions and it may cut down on the number of individual emails and responses you need to answer.

• Attend Class
  • Do TAs need to be present for synchronous sessions you are offering?
• Take Class Notes
  • If TAs attend synchronous sessions, will they need to take notes and share with students?
• Take Attendance
  • How will you uphold or modify your existing attendance policy, and what role will TAs play in gathering and recording this data? Here are some suggestions for how you may evaluate attendance: 
    • 1) Ask students to complete an Instapoll or Slido quiz by a certain time (for asynchronous models) or during your synchronous lecture/discussion. 
    • 2) If you ask students to complete discussion posts or assignments, consider counting their responses for both attendance and participation.
• Conduct Review Sessions
• Conduct Lab / Discussion Sessions
  • What will this look like for STEM TAs given that some labs will be closed for the foreseeable future? Some TAs may also not feel comfortable running these labs for personal reasons. What electronic resources can professors offer in lieu of experiments or labs and to what degree can TAs support them in compiling and sharing these resources?

• If you didn’t already have weekly team meetings, will you now do so? Offer biweekly team meetings if you have multiple TAs?

• Grading Assignments and Exams
  • General suggestions regarding grading both major and minor assignments: Consider selecting a specific day and time for 
    • 1) when you will share rubric and grading expectations 
    • 2) when students will submit the assignment, and 
    • 3) when TAs will be required to turn around grading
• Grading/Facilitating Discussion Boards 
  • Professors might consider writing discussion post questions/prompts and providing a clear rubric so that TAs can grade them. Here are some questions to consider: 
    • 1) Are the posts a completion grade? Will TAs just "check off" that the student completed the assignment on time? 
    • 2) Will the TAs be required to comment on the discussion boards? If so, how frequently? 
    • 3) If the discussion posts are graded, consider using a model used in the English department. For a short assignment worth 10 points, an exemplary assignment earns 10 points, a strong assignment earns 7 points, and an incomplete assignment earns 5 points. This is clear to students before grading, and it helps TAs save time because they are not worrying about point differentials.
• Proctor Exams
  • If you offer exams, will you do so through Proctorio on Canvas? What role would you ask TAs to play in this process of uploading and proctoring exams (if any)? Will you consider take home open note exams over email or essays in lieu of exams? How will you accommodate students with accommodations who may require extended time or certain testing environments?
• Proctor Make-up Exams
  • Will there be opportunities for make up exams? If so, what role will TAs play in facilitating this or tracking whether or not make up exams happen? On a related note, please make it clear who should be the point person for any new SSD accommodation materials which may come in at this time
• Maintain Class Grades
• Compute Final Grades
  • Clarify again what your end of semester expectations are regarding computing, posting, and submitting grades. Have there been any changes to your expectations?
• Post Grades to Canvas

• In what ways do you prefer to stay in touch? Phone, email, or text? What is the average time the TA can expect a response, and vice versa? 

• For most TA appointments, TA workload should not exceed an average of 20 hours per week. Once you have discussed the duties for which the TA is responsible, how does that break down in terms of average number of hours per week? For example, each week, if a graduate dedicates
  • 3 hours attending lecture, 
  • 2 hours teaching discussion section,
  • 3 hours holding office hours, and  
  • 1 hour in a staff meeting,

How are the remaining 11-12 hours distributed with a TA’s’ other responsibilities such as grading, meeting with students by appointment, offering test reviews, copying exams or proctoring make-ups, etc.? Will the virtual model change any of these general expectations you previously had for face-to-face classes? Are there any new or different responsibilities to add without going over the 20 hour max?

• TAs are not responsible for assisting with the instructor’s personal research, errands, or personal tasks. They are not responsible for the faculty’s class sessions, and should not deliver primary lectures. For the Handbook of Operating Procedures section on TA duties, see https://www.policies.utexas.edu/policies/teaching-assistants
• Title IX: University policy prohibits sexual interactions or romantic relationships, including consensual relationships, between an employee and an undergraduate student. Be mindful of that when you interact with your students, and make sure to maintain appropriate boundaries.