Course Responsibilities

CBS Courses with Laboratories

(modified with permission from form provided by TA Development Office, Human Resources, 1994)

This form is intended to facilitate a meeting between TAs, their supervising professors/instructors, and the Lab Services Coordinator from the CBS Instructional Labs. Its purpose is to clarify expectations and responsibilities. You may want to customize the questions to meet the requirements of your specific position. Each person should retain a copy for reference.

Course Title: _____________________________
Instructor name: __________________________
Office:________________________ Phone number: e-mail: __________
Any other means for contact? (e.g. home phone)
Any dates Instructor will be unavailable during quarter?
Who is in charge when Instructor is away?
TA name: ___________________________ Appointment % ______ Hours/week _______
Office:________________________ Phone number: e-mail: __________
Any other means for contact? (e.g. home phone)
Any dates TA will be unavailable during quarter?
What are the arrangements to cover the lab?
If the TA is sick, who do they call?
Who makes the arrangements to cover the lab in cases of illness?
Lab Services Coordinator's name:__________________________
Office:________________________ Phone number: e-mail: __________
Any other means for contact? (e.g. home phone)

Date of initial meeting ___________

1. Start and end your lab session on time.
2. Reserve the last 10 minutes or so of lab time for the clean-up. Begin reminding students to clean-up as the end of lab approaches. Clean-up guidelines will be posted in the lab. The Lab Services Coordinator will inform you about any special situations (e.g. special hazardous waste) during the weekly meetings.
3. Stress to your students the importance of clean workstations, not just in a teaching lab, but as a good habit to acquire for good science.
4. Be familiar enough with the lab exercise, the lab room, and the materials used to lead the class and answer questions. This may mean running the experiment ahead of your students so that YOU know how to do it. Talk to your Lab Services Coordinator to set this up.
5. Talk to the Instructor, other TAs and the Lab Services Coordinator to get hints about what might go wrong during the class and how to fix/solve/deal with it..
6. Be aware of the time. If the lab will run over, you may have to make arrangements to move to a different room or to have students stop at a different stopping place than planned.

Be sure all equipment is off or in standby mode, as appropriate, before you leave. This saves bulb life in spectrophotometers and microscopes and prevents fires in heating equipment such as water baths.

It is difficult to schedule make-up labs. Are make-up labs allowed in your course? __yes __ no
If yes, here are a few guidelines to help:

1. Stress to your students the importance of attending all lab sessions. Stress punctuality also.
2. Have a plan in mind before the course begins to cover what students who work in pairs or groups will do if a partner is absent (e.g. continue the lab, providing partner with data; continue the lab, leaving some part to be completed by partner, etc.)
   
3. If at all possible, students should arrange to attend a different lab section later in the week.
   
4. If a make-up lab is necessary, the TA must make arrangements with the Lab Services Coordinator who will provide materials and reagents at an agreed upon time. The TA or Instructor is responsible for supervising the students during the make-up lab time.

Although the Lab Services Coordinator is often very knowledgeable about the course because of past experience, s/he is NOT the TA. Students should come to TA or the Instructor with questions. Should TA have questions about the lab or its set-up, the TA may ask the Lab Services Coordinator. However, s/he may refer the question to the Instructor, especially if the question relates more to course content, format, etc. rather than laboratory support.

Finally, the CBS Instructional Labs welcomes suggestions for improvement.