When you’re stuck in a lecture with hundreds of students, recitations provide a fantastic opportunity to ask questions, solidify your understanding on the topic being covered or connect with other students in your class in a smaller, more relaxed setting.

However, teaching assistants can make or break a recitation experience. An encouraging, helpful and knowledgeable TA can improve a student’s learning immensely, while one who is uninterested, unengaged or unsure of the material can only make things more confusing. Even TAs who take their jobs seriously may end up being too hard on their students just to prove a point. The hit or miss quality TAs possess leads to frustration, boredom and unequal learning experiences.

Students aren’t the only ones in a classroom that are pressured to do well and show engagement. TAs are a vital part of connecting a student to the content of the class and that comes with a great deal of responsibility.

Tristan Beach has been a TA in Steinhardt’s Media, Culture and Communication department since beginning his time at New York University last fall, but has been teaching for over 10 years. Despite teaching for over a decade, he prefers to think of himself not as an expert but an experienced learner and facilitator.

He fears boring his students, wasting their time and not being able to assist them in achieving certain learning outcomes.

“I remember what it was like to encounter academic challenges at that stage in my life and like to think I can foresee stumbling blocks,” Beach said. “I both want to be accessible to my students and enjoy strategizing how best to work through the material with them.”

Although NYU boasts many great TAs, Steinhardt freshman Siena Pilnick believes there is definitely an inconsistency.

“One of my TAs was passionate about the topic and really gave it her all in regards to engaging our section with the material in fun and creative way,” Pilnick said. ‘On the other hand, I’ve also had TAs that I felt were lacking.”

She explained she had experience with certain TAs who either didn’t have the desired expertise on the coursework or acted as if they didn’t want to be there.

Tisch freshman Ryan Chen said the quality of TAs can vary depending on the class.

“I think most of the TAs are doing what they are supposed to do,” Chen said. “Whether or not they’re equipped enough I think depends from class to class.”

Steinhardt freshman Gracie West believes problems can lie in a lack of communication professor and their TAs, and this can even impact grades.

“Some are very helpful and I feel like they help me understand the material, others confused me because of a lack of communication with the professor,” West said. “One TA used different methods than we learned in class and this confused a lot of us. Everyone needs to be on the same page in order to have a coherent class.”

Tisch junior Kyle Schmidt said it’s hard approaching the TA sometimes because they don’t understand his concerns as well as the professor would.

“From my experience with TAs at Tisch, they generally are the professor’s slave to all the technological things that happen in class,” Schmidt said. “Many times I have wanted to ask my TAs a question about the curriculum but know that it would be best if they were answered by the actual professors.”

Regardless of lackluster performance from some of her TAs, Pilnick understands that being a TA comes with demanding responsibilities and believes treating students as peers is important.

“Anyone who decidedly takes the role should be commended,” Pilnick said. “That being said, when a TA goes into the experience open to learning things themselves and treats the students more like peers, the environment in the section and the students’ opinions of the class reflect that positively.”

Email Rachael Heistuman at [email protected].