Learning Assistants (LAs) are outstanding undergraduates who serve as instructional assistants in introductory physics courses, aiding the professor and improving the learning experience of the students. They help facilitate labs/lectures and small-group discussions, answering student questions, assisting with equipment, and probing student reasoning using effective questioning techniques. Essentially, they work with the professor as a second instructor to help deliver the most effective learning experience possible to the students.
Benefits:
- Valuable teaching experience
- Potentially interested in teaching, but don’t know what it’s like to interact with students? Serving as an LA can give you a taste! There’s nothing quite like the satisfaction of helping someone else have an “aha!” moment when they “get it.”
- Grad school in your future? Grad schools love to see that you’ve worked with students, since it means you will already have some experience when you begin as a graduate teaching assistant.
- Reinforce your own learning
- Even if you aced your intro courses, having to help novice students learn these topics forces you to understand the content in new ways and at a deeper level. That reinforcement will come in handy when it comes time for your upper-level courses, GREs, MCATs, job interviews, etc.
- Get course credit
- Serving as an LA is an official physics course (PHY290 or PHY291), worth 0.5 course units.
Currently we have LAs serving in PHY 103, 162/3, 201, 202, 203, 204, and 321. To be eligible to work as an LA in one of these courses, a student must have received a B or higher in that course (or are currently taking the course but will receive at least a B). Students who have taken PHY203 may LA in either PHY201 or PHY203, and similarly students who have taken PHY204 are qualified for both PHY202 and PHY204.
Successful applicants will participate in a half-day orientation workshop to be trained in basic pedagogical techniques. This will teach LAs how to ask and answer questions effectively, facilitate small-group discussions, and other vital teaching skills. In addition, LAs will meet once each week to prepare with a faculty member (this usually entails running through the lab activity for that week). LAs should expect to spend ~5 hours/week total (including both contact time and preparation), in line with a 0.5CU experience.
The deadline to apply as an LA for the Fall 2021 semester is August 6th. If you have any questions, you may contact the LA Coordinator Prof. AJ Richards at aj.richards@tcnj.edu.