By wpengine April 23, 2003
The last weeks of the semester are often the most trying time for Teaching Assistants (T.A.s). Grading assignments, holding extra office hours for exam-antsy students, and completing their own studies can be difficult, according to Joan Moriarty grad, currently an instructor of ILRLE 240: Economics of Wages and Employment. But for T.A.s across the University and in the College of Arts and Sciences in particular, the pressure seems even more intense because of a shortage of assistants. According to Philip E. Lewis, the Harold A. Tanner dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, the problem is fairly widespread. “There are seven or eight departments legitimately lacking in T.A.s,” Lewis said in an interview on March 25. “Students see that pressure more in large courses, in departments like economics and psychology,” he added. Moriarty, the current president of the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly, stated the shortage has deeply impacted graduate students. A T.A. for five semesters herself, Moriarty feels that large lecture courses and large sections are taxing to graduate students. “Graduate students must weigh being the T.A. they want to be” – devoting extensive time to preparing for sections and holding office hours, for example – “and completing their own work in the time they have,” Moriarty said. Often times, in this tradeoff, graduate students find they simply cannot devote as much time to teaching as they would like. According to Moriarty, T.A.s sincerely “want to be good teachers,” but when large class sizes lead to hours of grading, the result is less attention and face-time for individual students. Moriarty added succinctly, “graduate students are definitely working more than they’re paid for.” The immediate solution is to add more T.A.s. According to Dean Lewis, the arts college is committed to providing more resources for graduate student teaching assistantships. By creating additional endowed T.A. positions, and postdoctoral teaching fellowships, the arts college hopes to add somewhere between 30 to 40 additional T.A.s over the current level of approximately 560. The efforts in this area will have to be undertaken by the incoming dean of the arts college. Dean Lewis’ term ends July 1. Moriarty welcomed this effort, arguing that spreading the workload among additional T.A.s would serve the University’s interests. Not only will undergraduates receive more personal attention, a crucial element in enhancing their education, but graduate students could devote more energy toward completing their Ph.D.s on time, she said. However, in the long run, simply increasing the number of T.A.s may not be enough. Prof. Uri Possen, chair of the economics department, noted that while the arts college did increase the allotment of T.A.s to economics courses in response to swelling student enrollment, there is a better solution. “Some of the overcrowding can be alleviated with the help of T.A.s,” Possen said. “However, we would prefer to solve this problem by offering more courses rather than relying on more and more T.A.s.” By hiring several new assistant professors, Possen noted that the department could accomplish two goals at once: it could add additional courses and reduce class size, thereby decreasing the reliance on T.A.s. In the past year, the economics department managed to hire several new faculty members. Whether this hiring can continue depends on the arts college’s budget and funding constraints. Prof. Peter Dear, director of graduate studies in the field of history, suggested that the difficulty in allocating T.A.s is structural. “The graduate school admits graduate students who need to be supported by TAships,” Dear stated. “While, in history’s case, it’s the College of Arts and Sciences that provides the TAships to assist in teaching. There’s no adequate coordination between those two things.” Whatever the cause, Lewis stressed that the question of T.A. allocation will “remain something that the College will have to work on in the future.” He stated that although the various departments can function in the current state, “professors can really do more in a course with additional T.A.s.”Archived article by Michael Dickstein
By wpengine April 23, 2003
This weekend, Cornellians will again have the opportunity to attend what Playboy magazine once called “the classiest party in the Ivy League.” The Victory Club Charity Ball, a black-tie affair complete with legalized gambling and live entertainment, will be held this Saturday at the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity house. “We’re expecting this spring’s Victory Club to be the biggest yet,” said Phil Dubrovsky ’05, one of the event’s organizers. “As far as university parties go, nothing compares to Victory Club. This will be a night to remember.” While gamblers try their luck at blackjack tables, money and roulette wheels, they will be treated to live entertainment by the Cayuga’s Waiters, Nothing But Treble, Johnny Russo’s East Hill Stompers Jazz Band and the notorious Motown band, Big Daddy and the Soul Patrol. Dubrovsky guarantees a “night of elegance and class, complete with everything from chocolate covered strawberries to a limousine ride home.” Victory Club, which is normally a bi-annual affair, had to be canceled last fall due to various complications that took place during the planning stages of the event. According to organizer George Doerre ’04, the planning for this semester’s Victory Club began in January. “We’ve had several months of planning. These things take a lot of time. We have to book the entertainment and get approvals,” Doerre said. Proceeds from the event–gambling loses from the night–will benefit the Ithaca Fire Department Firefighters Memorial Fund and the Ithaca Police chapter of Concerns of Police Survivors. Victory Club, which has its roots in celebrations sponsored by the brothers of Alpha Delta Phi as long ago as 1918, is currently its own organization complete with unique federal and state tax identification numbers allowing organizers to secure a gambling license through the New York State Racing and Wagering Board. “This is the same board that registers church bingo and things like that,” said Doerre. He is quick to point out, however that “It’s unique that as a bunch of college students we have the resources and repoire to pull this [event] off.” While Victory Club has earned a reputation over the years as one of the most popular formal events on the Cornell campus, there is a great deal of mystery surrounding the origins of the event. Some sources place the first Victory Club Charity Ball in the 1960s while others say it originated decades earlier. Doerre indicates that the real roots of the event may be found in an event held nearly 90 years ago at what was then the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity house. The 1918 event was held to encourage the sale of Victory Bonds during the first world war. The event was then forced to go underground for the duration of the prohibition years. During the so-called “roaring twenties” the event supposedly earned its bawdy reputation as a night filled with live jazz, gambling and plenty of illegal alcohol. While the origins of the modern Victory Club Charity Ball most directly stem from events sponsored by Alpha Delta Phi in the late 1970s, the speakeasy atmosphere of those early events remains despite the evening gowns and tuxedos. “The event is unreal,” says Adil Ahamed ’04, a member of the Cayuga’s Waiters a cappella group who will be attending his sixth Victory Club this weekend. “Victory Club is an event that the Waiters consider a very important part of our year — we always look forward to it,” he said. Doerre says that organizers initiated a strong marketing campaign this year aimed at bringing people back to the event after being absent from the campus last fall and that he expects between 400 and 500 people to attend. “Last year’s Victory Club was a smash hit and we’d like to meet and exceed that,” he said. “We expect this, as always, to be the classiest party around.” The Alpha Delta Phi house, the John Russell Pope mansion, is at 777 Stewart Ave. Victory Club tickets are available for purchase with CornellCard at the Willard Straight Box Office or through the brothers of Alpha Delta Phi. The first twenty tickets sold today will include a five dollar gambling voucher. More information is available at the VC website, www.victoryclub.info. Archived article by Nate Brown