[inDheart]

Originally Posted by FoJaR

also as soon as you take a few classes in your major and get As in them, start looking for work as a TA. at my school it was not only the best hourly wage around, but also the most fun, and really helped me nail down some of the stuff i was shaky on, at least early on... and after that it was just a nice relaxing job where i felt like i was making a difference. grading sucks though, try and not have to do that.

well of course, compare rates. my department pays better than most others i've heard about here (many do TA positions for credit instead - ouch!), and more than the official school-wide tutoring centers. it's worth at least trying out while you're in a place that lets you TA.

grading duties also vary widely based on school and course policies - i'm only allowed to "mark", where a mark becomes a grade once it's been spot checked by someone higher on the course staff. others allow undergraduates to assign grades for strictly objective criteria. i also have some degree of choice over who i work for, and for fall i've chosen a section with relatively little grading overhead.

TA work can be relaxing; however, it is also one of those jobs where you doing too little work is often a sign that students are either doing really well or falling off (vastly more often the latter), and that feels really dangerous and bad. i've gotten over it with more experience, but it's something i've seen many other new TAs wonder about.

(incidentally, i'm helping work on a TA development program - it's probably not a topic for this thread, but send me your stories!)