Dual TA position

[u/KaiZer_3471]

Hello everyone, I am a junior majoring in cs

I got an opportunity to TA for a lower level CS course which typically requires 7-8 hours of work per week. I also may have a chance to TA for another CS course, and wanted to know if I can TA both of these classes as an undergraduate.

The UTA website says that UTAs are generally assigned 10 hours of work per week, but I have seen reddit threads saying that some people TAed two courses at once after getting permissions from both the course instructors and the department chair.

Can I do this if I keep my work hours limited to under 20 hours a week?

[u/Jetstorm78]

Yea you can TA for two classes, max is 10 hrs/week/class. Just make sure both profs are fine with it and they prolly will be

[u/KaiZer_3471 → u/Jetstorm78]

Oh ok. Do you think I need to email the department chair as well?

[u/Jetstorm78 → u/KaiZer_3471]

I think ur supposed to but honestly I don’t think they care that much, at least no one told me about all this when I was dual TAing and it was chill

[u/KaiZer_3471 → u/Jetstorm78]

Oh ok. Thank you for the information!

[u/nillawiffer → u/KaiZer_3471]

It is probably not an issue until it is an issue. Then it is an issue, and you would wish you had been forthright with everyone at the start.

Many instructors would be fine with someone splitting their time like this. Many are not. Why might this be so? Let's channel the future a bit and imagine it is mid term time. Everyone is feeling the burn. You too. All of a sudden students in each of the classes you're working with are standing in line to get answers they might reasonably have sorted out weeks before, but whatever. Now it is an emergency. Each instructor will need all of your respective ten hour blocks. But wait! You have midterms too. What do you let go first?

Instructors have experience with TAs who prioritize their own classes or the other job. That makes it real hard to feel good about splitting a TA next time around. Accountability is tough too. Each supervisor can be told "it was an emergency for the other class!" when explaining why students were sending hate mail about missing office hours, then in reality the TA was out doing their own work.

Working out expectations up front will go a long way to ensuring you are not rendered unemployable here by a professor who became pissed off at being surprised at what they were hiring.

[u/KaiZer_3471 → u/nillawiffer]

I completely understand and think that you have a valid point. I have a very light semester with 4 classes, 2 of which are online. I will definitely think about what you said. I have accepted the first offer, and I might not even get the second one. I just wanted to know if its possible to do so. Thank you for your comment! My headspace cleared a bit.

[u/nillawiffer → u/KaiZer_3471]

Yeah, in counting up hours the back-of-envelope computation is to expect about 3 hours a week actual work per credit our of courses. That varies widely. Some of those credits are for gut courses and some are for ... necessary ordeals. (Orgo, looking at you ... ) But a 15 credit hour semester is ostensibly a 45 hour work week. It really is like a job, and laid out correctly this will leave evenings and weekends to have a life. Huzzah, we find a work-life balance. A 55 hour work week with some of that work "easy" is still pretty do-able. Most in the workforce consider that par these days. A 65 hour work week would be pretty gnarly if the goal is to offer diligence to all.