Graduate Student Instructor Program
Graduate student instructors (TAs and AIs) contribute greatly to the level of teaching excellence at UT Austin. Because GSIs work so closely with undergraduates, your effectiveness as a teacher is vital to their academic success. As you become a more accomplished teacher, you will enrich your interactions with students and build valuable skills for your future professional life.
DIIA's Graduate Student Instructor Program provides opportunities to advance your pedagogical, professional, and personal development. The program emphasizes collaboration with departments and graduate student support organizations. We monitor its flexibility, relevance, and effectiveness through ongoing evaluation and feedback from members of the University community.
The GSI Program is an initiative of the Office of the Provost, the Office of Graduate Studies, and the Division of Instructional Innovation and Assessment.
We offer an array of opportunities to enhance your GSI experience at UT Austin.
"I use a quick-write at the beginning of class to focus students on the key concepts in their learning and readings. What I do is post an open-ended topic that builds on higher-level thinking skills like analyzing, synthesizing, or making a connection or application to the topic." (more...) |
Promising
PracticesASPECTS Program
ASPECTS — Advancing Students' Professional Excellence with Certificates in Teaching Series — offers multiple sessions throughout each long semester designed to promote and encourage ongoing growth and development in teaching and professionalism. DIIA offers certificates in pedagogy, complemented by sessions from the Office of Graduate Studies in professional development. Session topics include "Understanding Your Students," "Leading Effective Discussions," and "Building an Online Community." Certificates are awarded based on attending three related seventy-five minute sessions, two selections from a list of electives or attendance at the Graduate Student Colloquium, and receiving a passing score on an application-based essay.
For more information or to register, go to http://www.utexas.edu/academic/diia/gsi/aspects/.
Graduate Student Colloquium
At the beginning of each academic year DIIA sponsors a colloquium for graduate students. During this one-day colloquium graduate students will have an opportunity to learn about pedagogy and network with other graduate students interested in teaching and learning. DIIA welcomes proposal submissions for this year's colloquium, Creating Meaningful Learning, from any academic discipline. The Call for Proposals is now available.
At the beginning of each academic year DIIA sponsors a colloquium for graduate students. During this one-day colloquium graduate students will build instructional skills, and new teaching assistants will be introduced to expectations for teaching at the university. Attendees also receive elective credit toward an ASPECTS certificate.
398T Workshops
In support of the GSI Program, DIIA staff offer up to two 398T Workshops a year in:
- Professional Development for Graduate Student Instructors
- Enhancing Your Instructional Effectiveness
- Technology-Enhanced Teaching and Learning
Please see our complete list of offerings.
Contact Mark Decker (232-1774) for information or to schedule a 398T Workshop.
Individual Consulting
GSIs commonly find some instructional coaching helpful during their teaching career at UT. DIIA staff devoted to GSI-specific teaching needs are available to support and advise you on syllabus and activity design, effective classroom management, and even strategies for inspiring (or re-inspiring) yourself and your students.
Contact Michael Sweet at m.sweet@mail.utexas.edu to set up an e-mail, telephone, or face-to-face conversation about any aspect of your teaching.
Midterm Assessment Consulting
Frequent feedback from students assists instructors in meeting their students’ needs. Instructors may tend to rely solely on the final student course surveys, far too late to make any adjustments that could help students learn more effectively. DIIA offers an online tool, the Ongoing Course Assessment (OCA), for instructors to get anonymous feedback from students about their classes. Using this tool frequently throughout the semester will ensure that you and your students are meeting the learning goals of the course, giving you the opportunity make changes if needed.
DIIA staff is available to meet with GSIs who are interested in designing their own mid-semester and ongoing feedback instruments for their classes, or other assessment tools.
Promising Practices
You'll find what we call Promising Practices in side bars throughout this Web site. In some, your peers write about teaching methods and communication skills they use that work with their students. In others, faculty members respond to the question "what are some of the characteristics of the perfect GSI?"
We encourage you to contribute your own teaching success stories. Send your submissions to promisingpractices@utlists.utexas.edu. We look forward to celebrating your "promising practices" on this Web site soon!
Office of Graduate Studies
The Office of Graduate Studies supports DIIA's academic and professional development initiatives to enhance teaching and learning for graduate student instructors at The University of Texas at Austin. ASPECTS, an initiative of the Office of the Provost, OGS, and DIIA has especially benefited from this collaboration.
Visit the OGS Web site to learn more about other graduate professional development opportunities.
Take advantage of the resources available to you in the GSI Program!
If you have comments or questions about the program, please e-mail us at gsi@utlists.utexas.edu.