TAs to get written pay contracts

All graduate students who receive funding from the University must receive a written agreement detailing the conditions for the funding as of October 1, Vice Provost for Graduate Education Janice Madden announced last week. The agreement will outline the amount of funding, the time period it covers and a job description, including the number of hours of work per week and the specific responsibilities of the student, Madden said. A standardized form was not created for the agreement, but the compact that the Graduate Student Activities Council designed last semester can be used, Madden said. The compact, which has a list of questions about funding details and student tasks, is to be filled out and signed by both the professor and the student. The compact limits students to working 15 to 20 hours per week. Madden said the University decided to mandate the written agreements in order to clarify teaching and research assistants' duties. She said she has not dealt with any disputes between professors and their assistants in the year she has been at the University, but "it's difficult for a graduate student to complain about this." Madden said that the written agreement "empowers the student" because "now the student has in writing what they're expected to do" and can take action if this is violated. "I think both the graduate students and the faculty need to be protected," Madden said. Members of GSAC, which worked on having compacts distributed in the School of Arts and Sciences, said yesterday they were happy with the new policy. "We're very pleased to see the TA compact being implemented as a part of University policy, particularly because, in the past, communication with the graduate chairs, faculty and students about the distribution and use of the compact has been difficult," said Brian Huck, treasurer of GSAC. Huck said the compacts still have not been distributed in many departments of the School of Arts and Science, although last spring SAS agreed to distribute them to all teaching assistants. The deans of the graduate schools agreed unanimously last summer to pass the new policy, Madden said. Madden said that she may also use the forms to analyze the working conditions of students in the future.

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