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sleepyandtired

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  1. "it would completely depend on how you asked them and how well you knew them as to whether or not it was appropriate." 'Would it be possible for you to cover for me?' was how I asked, in an e-mail. I knew this person for about 4 years. We weren't/aren't friends, more co-workers. We do occasionally socialize. We're also in the same program, same status - we're both in our last years. "If you couldn't make 1/3rd of the schedule classes, I don't see how you could have done a reasonable job of the TAship. Personally, I would have seen if there was another you could take." By the time I found out about the scheduling conflict, I already signed the contract... I didn't get the class syllabus until afterwards and I was under the assumption that the lab would have been run differently. The lab portion had 3 "topics", where in previous years, 1 TA runs all the sessions for topic 1, and the second runs the sessions for topic 2, and both do topic 3. If It was done that way, as I assumed, I would have had no scheduling conflict. I only found out about each TA getting their own lab section a few days before I left. And when I found out about the scheduling conflict, I offered to change my flight so that I wouldn't miss a third lab- which I agree, 3 labs out of 10 is really excessive. "but as with your first question, tone and manner is where it would really come into question anyway" Yah, that's the really subjective part. I just found it kind of off-putting that he was lecturing me in front of the other TA ... like why couldn't he have done it in private? And I personally would never print out a list of criticisms and lecture a TA. If I had issues with a TA, I'd frame it as "what you can do next time" ... which he didn't do. Even when I asked him what could have been done better, he said "I don't know". So, that's why I felt like the whole conversation was more an ego trip (on his part) rather than a genuine "hey, you messed up .. here's how to do better in the future". I just don't like how he made a big fuss on how he "chose" me out of a pool of suitable candidates, when the way I found out about the TAship was from people in his lab telling me that he was trying to get rid of me =/. How would you approach someone if you weren't happy with their performance? And as well, I think I would have talked to the person during the term and fixed it then. "As to his grounds for a formal complaint- what happened to the labs you skipped? Who covered them? Was that arrangement made and agreed upon well in advance?" The other TA ran the first lab I missed, no problem - she was free, and it was a five minute introduction lab. The second one, the instructor covered one, and the other TA covered the other (she only had a scheduling conflict for one session). We made the arragnements before I left, and I marked extra assignments for her (she got the better deal, trust me on that one .. that assignment was so painful to grade) 'It's a completely different matter if you were able to get someone to cover for you without disrupting their schedule, but I'm not sure that was the case here." I don't think it disrupted the other TA's schedule ... I don't know if it disrupted the instructor's though. He wasn't taking any courses and it wasn't during class time, and he wasn't doing any research. So I don't know. "2/10 classes at $6k per semester means that you're getting paid ~$1200 for work that they're covering for you on. That's a big favor. Similarly, having someone else cover your classes isn't ideal for your students" The TA ship makes up part of my stipend and is worth $9500 or something to that effect. If I didn't take it, I'd get minimum funding (which is what my current stipend is with the TA-ship minus around $6000 ... that's why I said that I'd be short $6000). The $9500 covers 260 hours, of which most of it is marking assignments and prep work. The lab itself (of the two that I missed) would equal 6 hours out of 260, which is a bit less from the $1200 that you've calculated. It's more like $230. The first lab I missed was 5 minutes, where you introduce yourself. The second one was an actual lab, where the prep work was already done the prior week.
  2. Hello, I would like some opinions on this situation: I'm a phd student/candidate (if you want to be specific) in my last year and was hired as a lab TA at the end of August. The instructor is another phd student/candidate. I found out that I was hired, not via an e-mail from the department or instructor, but from a friend who the instructor was trying to convince to take the job from me. I e-mail the instructor on August 31 asking for the syllabus, as I wanted to know the lab times. I don't get a response until Sept 4, at which I finally get the syllabus and realize that I would be away for 3 of the 10 labs. For two labs, I would be at home for a friend's wedding (flight booked months in advance, flying out on Sept 8), and another lab a month later, where I would be at a conference (also planned/booked months in advance). So as you can see, I get the course timetable about 4 days before I'm set to fly across the country. So I ask the instructor, who was a lab TA for the course (2 TAs run the labs, but the other TA has class when my labs are going on) for the last 3 years, if he could sub in for me. I get called in to a meeting, with him and the other TA, where he proceeds to tell me, for about 10 minutes, about how inappropriate and unprofessional it was for me to ask him, the instructor, to cover a TA's lab. He had asked several other people, and his own supervisor, and they all agree that it was inappropriate/unprofessional. He told me that he was really shocked by the request. He also said that I should have, before taking on the job, checked with him to make sure that it was OK for me to leave, and that if it wasn't, I shouldn't have taken the job (i.e. decline the TA ship). He emphasized that he hired/chose me (although the department pays my stipend, and as you can read above, I don't think I was really wanted??). Anyway, I ended up paying $150 to change my flight/bus so I would only miss 2 out of the 10 labs, of which one was the intro lab, the "hello, I am your TA, you can go now" kind. Today, the instructor spent about 45 minutes with a literal printed list of grievances that he had with me. His major issue was what I mentioned above, that I missed 3 out of 10 labs - I actually only missed 2, but he was really set on me missing 3 (I don't think he believed me in the end when I told him that I changed my travel plans to make it to one of the labs). In addition, he said that I treated him as a phd student rather than my "boss" ... I'm not entirely sure what that meant, but I assume he's referring to him running a lab for me? He had a list of issues (the major one was missing the 2/10 labs), and he said that mostly because that I missed 2/10 labs, he was considering making a formal complaint against me. So - my questions: -was I inappropriate for asking the instructor to run a lab session for me? -should I have declined the TA-ship (and miss out on about $6000), or keep the TA ship but cancel my trips? -was his behavior appropriate? i.e., the 45 minute talk about how he was "dissatisifed with my performance as a TA"? -did he have grounds for a formal complaint?
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