Student writes on a board.

What we expect from TAs

We expect our TAs to meet their job responsibilities, to act as professionals, and to avoid any ethical or legal conflicts. Unlike most assignments you have at Georgia Tech, this is a real job.

Professional Responsibilities:

  • Helping Students: Stay professional whether you are communicating with students in-person, by e-mail, or via Piazza. If a student comes to talk to you, listen carefully and attentively.
  • Grading: You may be grading homework, projects, labs and/or exams. You must grade on time, and consistent with the criteria of the assignments.
  • Office Hours: You must be on time and be prepared. Do not schedule office hours during lectures.
  • Meetings: Plan to be on time every time. Never miss a meeting without letting the Head TA or the lecturer know your extenuating circumstances.

Legal Responsibilities:

  • Understand your duties under FERPA, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
  • Under FERPA, you may only discuss academic information about a specific student with that student. It is illegal to share that information with anyone else, including other students and parents.

Ethical Responsibilities:

  • You cannot date anyone in your course section, or any other section of the course you are TA-ing. If you are dating someone who has enrolled in the course, let the Head TA know so that you can be assigned to a different course. Even appearing to cross this line is forbidden.
  • Keep a professional distance from the students in your section. You cannot have good friends in your section of a course.
  • Show respect for other TAs, faculty and staff members. You are all part of the same team.
  • Information such as student grades, drafts of assignments, etc. must be kept on Georgia Tech computers and within Canvas. Other options risk a data spill, and are therefore not allowed.
  • When you have review sessions, be careful to treat everyone fairly. You must either have the review session in person during the scheduled recitation or lecture. If you want to do a review session outside of that time, you must record it instead and make it available to all students. It is unethical to set up a review session so that some people see it in person and some online.