Getting T.A.-ships

[quicksilver]

Kind of a ridiculous question, but do schools offer you T.A. ships/funding when they accept you (and you've applied for the T.A. ship), or do you have to plead with them? I got my first acceptance, but nothing indicated a T.A. ship. 

 

Thanks!

[padthai234]

Really depends on the school and even the specific department. I think generally when you have guaranteed teaching as part of your acceptance they'll tell you in your letter... But you should just email the admissions coordinator and ask for clarification

[fuzzylogician]

As part of the admissions offer, you should get a proposed funding package. If this was not made clear when the offer was made, you should ask about it -- whether there is any funding, if so how much money per year and for how many years, is there a tuition waiver, do you get health insurance, are there other benefits; are there requirements for keeping the funding (e.g. (warning: made up requirements follow:) a 3.5 GPA, completion of comps by the end of the second year, etc), and are there additional TA/RA requirements that come with the funding package. If there are TA/RA requirements, you should find out how many hours you are expected to work a week, and for how many semesters. Normally funding packages come with some mix of fellowships, TAships and RAships. Often, you don't have to teach in your first and last year but you have some teaching requirements in the other years. 

 

TAship is sometimes a part of funding packages and sometimes independently earned by the student (more often: in schools where not all the students are funded, or funding is competitive). You should ask which is the case for the school that accepted you. 

[TakeruK]

I think schools really should provide funding package information, in writing, along with or as part of your offer of admission. I would not want to take an offer that did not promise any actual funding or if I would have to compete for funding again every single year. But this might depend on the norms of the field--all of my offer letters clearly stated that I would get X dollars per year for Y hours of TA and/or RA work. Most letters do not promise a certain amount over the entire degree, but they should at least say something like funding will be continued with satisfactory performance or something like that.

[overworkedta]

From every school that I was accepted to and funded back in 2010, I got an offer that usually told me what the responsibilities were and my expected amount would be between the fellowship and stipend I had been offered.  I also received a full tuition waiver, health insurance, and some other things.  They detailed that I would be expected to pay fees.

[Porshyen]

How often are TA's/RA's and other funding opportunities extended to Master's students? 

[Loric]

How often are TA's/RA's and other funding opportunities extended to Master's students? 

 

Depends on the area of study and then the schools/departments themselves.

 

In in my old theater field it was assumed you'd be TA'ing, expected to be teaching a course or two by your second year if not your second semester. Funding was essentially built around your working for the school itself (tuition waivers, fellowships, etc.. were all to supplement that core income.) For my first semester I covered a few labs for classes and also co-taught a studio course (so I essentially got paid what an adjunct gets paid to teach a class.)

 

But I've found when applying to programs outside of that uniquely quirky field that I need to mention that I want to be considered to TA or teach. For example, I know I want to go into a non-theater design program.. but I have the skills to teach or TA the the scenic design class the school does offer for undergrads. I mentioned this to admissions and they said that it would be considered. However, if I hadn't mentioned it they may not have even considered it a possibility.

 

So if you randomly are fluent in Russian or something, having TA'ed it in undergrad, be sure to mention it to admissions. There may be something outside your department that you can do as well.

 

The entire premise of Hole in the Paper Sky is a guy getting a work study to fund his thesis in another department.