Graduate Assistantships

Rhetoric and Composition Program
Most graduate students begin teaching in our nationally renowned writing program. The Writing Program offers teaching associateships in two freshman writing classes, Basic Writing and College Writing. Some sections of these courses may be designed and taught as computer-assisted writing classes. Classes usually enroll 24 students and focus on the students' experience of the writing process; teaching methods include workshops, multiple drafts, peer response and evaluation, and individual conferences with the instructor. Admission to teach in the writing program is competitive; graduate students must fill out an application, provide supporting materials, and be interviewed by members of the Writing Program staff.

English and American Literature
Students who earn or enter the program with an M.A. in English are eligible to apply for a teaching associateshipship in the English department. During the academic year, graduate students teach General Education introductory literature courses such as: Man and Woman in Literature, Society and Literature, and The American Experience. Class size is approximately 35 students, and instructors have considberal latitude in designing their own syllabi within the General-Education guidelines. Students are also eligible to teach courses through the Department of Continuing Education which offers courses during Winter Session (January), Summer Session (June-July/July-August), and in the evenings during the academic terms. Courses available through Continuing Education include: Major British Writers, Film and Literature, Studies in Modern Fiction, Advanced Expository Writing, Science Fiction and the Imagination, as well as regular General Education offerings. The Director of Graduate Studies is responsible for making all teaching appointments in English. Appointments, as in the Writing Program, are by application.

Pedagogical Training
One of the special features of our graduate program is its attention to pedagogical practice and training. Graduate students leave our program as well-trained, experienced, and sophisticated professional instructors of literature and composition. They receive consistent and on-going contact with faculty mentors and teachers, and they are regularly evaluated on the teaching skills they are learning in the program. Entering graduate students who have been awarded a TO in the Writing Program meet for a one-week, intensive training session before the semester begins each fall. They are provided with a program syllabus which they can follow outright or adapt to their own uses.

Throughout the academic year, TOs in the Writing Program meet in a bi-weekly Course Directors' Group led by one of the faculty or staff specialists in Composition and Rhetoric. These small groups provide an on-going space in which to discuss assignments, classroom challenges, problem students, pedagogical practice and theory, and anything else pertaining to student teaching. The faculty or staff group leader visits the student's classroom once each semester and writes a report about the student's teaching. This report is kept on file and frequently used when students enter the job market. English Department literature TOs also meet in a General Education Course Directors' Group led bya faculty member in English and devoted specifically to issues faced in the multicultural classroom. Meeting once a month, this group also discusses syllabi choices, specific assignments, and the challenges posed by a non-English cohort in a literature class. Faculty group leaders visit each student's class once a semester and produce a teaching evaluation that goes in the student's graduate file.

Research Assistantships
RAs are offered in the journal English Literary Renaissance, and in the London Stage Project, the Massachusetts Center for Renaissance Studies, and in the Five Colleges Irish Studies Program.

Assistantship Remuneration
A full TO is considered a two-course load per year (one course each semester) and earns approximately $12,800 to $13,800 and a tuition and fee waiver. Half TAs and RAs also carry a tuition and fee waiver.