College Holds No Uniform Policy On Ratio of Graders to Students

There is no uniform policy for deciding the number of graders and course assistants, a survey of several departments revealed. Astronomy 1 for instance, with an enrollment near 50, has half as many assistants as English 151, with 470 students.

Departments which run the University's most popular courses frequently clash regarding the method of setting ratios. The University's largest course, Economics 1, has 16 assistants for 640 students.

"We select men on the basis of the various year's enrollment in the course," according to a spokesman. Section men are responsible for an average of 40 students, although there are many exceptions. Yet if enrollment should double from one year to the next, section men must double up.

Opposed to the Economic Department's method is the Department of English. A member of the Department pointed out the danger of applying such a system to a course like English 151, which has actually had a doubled enrollment since the last time it was given.

Edgar Rosenberg, Briggs-Copeland Assistant Professor of English Composition and leader of this course, reacts to the situation by increasing office hours to accommodate more students.

"I'll do my best so that the large size of the course does not stop me from giving students the attention which they may request."

Other graders, though, feel differently about the effect of this overburdening. As one of them said, "We have theses to write, courses to attend. We can't give all these extra students the time they need. To offer the students more time would extend the time required to write our theses."

According to the English Department, it is up to the instructor in charge to select his own assistants, and he may arrange the burden as he wishes. Rosenberg tries to assign his eight graders by giving the largest burdens to the most experienced assistants and to those with the most time. Some of his staff have 35 to 40 students, and none has over 60.

Using a complicated system of "fifths," the University attempts to avoid crowding graduate student's schedules with too much teaching. According to this system, no one may teach more than three fifths, or two sections and a lecture course per week.

At $1,000 a fifth, one teaching assistant calls this "the College's attempt to make sure we don't earn too much."