Most Ph.D. candidates hold Teaching Assistantships throughout their programs, and the practical experience of teaching is part of the candidate's preparation for a career in teaching.
Graduate students in Composition Studies typically teach First-Year Composition, ESL Composition, Creative Nonfiction, Technical Writing and Persuasive Writing. Advanced students with a strong background in literary studies will also have the opportunity to teach Critical Analysis and literature survey courses.
The course on teaching of composition (English 910) and the regular English 401 staff meetings supplement this experience, giving the teaching itself some theoretical underpinning and encouraging mutual reflection on teaching issues and strategies.
For those who want even stronger credentials in the teaching of composition, the seminar on teaching composition (English 917) allows students to do first-hand research.
Where appropriate, and subject to the availability of courses, Ph.D. students will have opportunities to teach a lower division course (for composition, English 501, 502, 503) some time during their third year of doctoral study.
In conjunction with teaching this course for the first time, each student will be matched with a tenured/tenure-track faculty
member who regularly teaches that course, and who preferably will also be teaching the course in the same semester. Faculty mentors will be chosen by the Graduate Director in consultation with the Department Chair and the student's exam committee chair. The faculty mentor will work with the doctoral student on his/her course syllabus, will meet regularly with the student to discuss the progress of the course, and will permit the student to sit in on his/her section of the course. The student will not receive course credit for the mentorship.
