How Are Course Chairs Selected?

Ideally, all willing graduate students will have a chance to chair a course in the RCS at least once.

Below are the qualities of a good chair. This list is distributed with the scheduling memo, along with a staff recommendation request.

Once the Language Program Director (LPD) has received all requests to chair, s/he meets with the Business Manager. The LPD may meet with one or both graduate representatives to make chair assignments.

The request forms are put into stacks according to what course the TA has offered to chair. We make a note of TAs willing to chair more than once course, or with no course preference.

Any TA requesting to chair a course s/he has never taught is given lowest priority.

Any TA who has been reprimanded for not meeting the administrative requirements of the course, or who has had grievances from students or TA s/he is CURRENTLY TEACHING, will not be given a chair assignment at this time. This will not prevent a TA from chairing in future semesters, unless there are new reprimands or grievances from students or fellow colleagues. TAs rarely receive grievances from students or fellow TAs. However, many TAs receive at one time or another, a letter of concern from me and/or a course chair, usually regarding the timely submission of test sections.

Ideally, chair positions are given fairly on a seniority basis. More often than not, however, several TAs of equal rank and experience request the same position. Here are some common scenarios:

Only one person asks to chair a course. This person will get the position unless:

s/he has never taught the course before (in which case the LPD will seek further applications)
the TA has the aforementioned administrative problems (in which case the LPD may or may not seek further applications depending on the nature or the extent of complaints against the TA).

If a TA appears to have chaired an inordinate number of courses, this TA was probably the only person to request the course a few of those times.

We must select between a TA who has chaired two or more times and a TA requesting to chair for the first time. We try to give the new person a chance. Likewise, between a person who has chaired twice and a person who has chaired three times, we would select the person who has chaired only twice.

When all else is equal... We consult the staff recommendations solicited from TAs. Inevitably, one of the people in the pool has had more recommendations than the other.

Qualifications for Course Chairs

The most successful course chairs will have a good number of the qualities listed below:

excellent interpersonal communication skills
organization skills
skills in persuading and negotiating
ability to maintain course policies and requirements
willingness to take responsibility
initiative
good teaching skills
good control of French
active involvement with teaching
proven effectiveness as course chairs
willingness to give the time necessary to do the job well
willingness and ability to work out problems and/or misunderstandings with and among colleagues