PhD teaching assistant at UoB

Hi there,

I hold a PhD offer to study at Birmingham medical school. I wanted to know about the availability of Teaching Assistantships and Lab demonstration jobs. If yes, how much one gets paid for being a PGTA or demonstrator?

Any valuable insight is highly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

Reply 1

Notoriety

22

Original post by Keysandblues

Hi there,

I hold a PhD offer to study at Birmingham medical school. I wanted to know about the availability of Teaching Assistantships and Lab demonstration jobs. If yes, how much one gets paid for being a PGTA or demonstrator?

Any valuable insight is highly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

Have you asked your PhD supervisor? Might be a good place to start.

Reply 2

toronto353

19

I would speak to your supervisor as they'll have the best and most accurate advice. However, I can tell you my experiences from when I used to be a PhD teaching assistant. Generally, these positions are used more in the arts and humanities than in STEM subjects and while you may have the chance to be a demonstrator or do some teaching, this is unlikely, so I wouldn't bank on gaining too much experience. My own experiences were as an arts and humanities PhD teaching assistant, but I know enough PhD students in various STEM departments to know that this is regularly, but not always the case. In terms of workload, you should be given guidance by the module convener so that preparation doesn't take up too much time, but I will say when you first start teaching that it will take up far more time than you think. Some universities/departments pay a set amount per hour, e.g. £45 (which encompasses preparation, teaching, marking, dealing with emails etc.) whereas others will pay per hour taught and then assign a number of hours for preparation as well and pay for that, e.g. £15 per hour teaching + £15 per hour prep. Generally, it's very rewarding, but can be rather exploitative - you will be paid an amount that doesn't fully reflect how much hard work you put in, so you may spend 2 hours preparing for a lesson because 1 hour isn't enough, but you'll only get paid for 1 hour's prep because the university states that's all you need. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have though.

Reply 3

Keysandblues

OP

4

Thank you, that's really helpful indeed. I was told by my supervisor about all the available opportunities in the school and he also mentioned about some training that I should take before start teaching. I'm sorry but I have one more question, whether taking up such position as a PGTA or Demonstrator will be too much to hinder one's PhD work progress (My supervisor advised me so) ? I know the answer to this question is subjective, however, I still want to know from who actually went past that situation. Thanks again.

Original post by toronto353

I would speak to your supervisor as they'll have the best and most accurate advice. However, I can tell you my experiences from when I used to be a PhD teaching assistant. Generally, these positions are used more in the arts and humanities than in STEM subjects and while you may have the chance to be a demonstrator or do some teaching, this is unlikely, so I wouldn't bank on gaining too much experience. My own experiences were as an arts and humanities PhD teaching assistant, but I know enough PhD students in various STEM departments to know that this is regularly, but not always the case. In terms of workload, you should be given guidance by the module convener so that preparation doesn't take up too much time, but I will say when you first start teaching that it will take up far more time than you think. Some universities/departments pay a set amount per hour, e.g. £45 (which encompasses preparation, teaching, marking, dealing with emails etc.) whereas others will pay per hour taught and then assign a number of hours for preparation as well and pay for that, e.g. £15 per hour teaching + £15 per hour prep. Generally, it's very rewarding, but can be rather exploitative - you will be paid an amount that doesn't fully reflect how much hard work you put in, so you may spend 2 hours preparing for a lesson because 1 hour isn't enough, but you'll only get paid for 1 hour's prep because the university states that's all you need. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have though.

Reply 4

toronto353

19

Original post by Keysandblues

Thank you, that's really helpful indeed. I was told by my supervisor about all the available opportunities in the school and he also mentioned about some training that I should take before start teaching. I'm sorry but I have one more question, whether taking up such position as a PGTA or Demonstrator will be too much to hinder one's PhD work progress (My supervisor advised me so) ? I know the answer to this question is subjective, however, I still want to know from who actually went past that situation. Thanks again.

So there's increasingly an expectation that PhD students undertake some training before they start teaching. When I first started teaching, that was more of a 'we would like you to have completed training' rather than a 'you must do it' and the training course was basically one morning which was fairly useless. Now it's more rigorous (owing to TEF). At my university, we were expected to have completed that basic morning course plus additional courses in teaching and marking. We all had to do a full-day refresher course each year as well and were not allowed to teach without this being completed, even if we'd previously taught before. This course covered disability awareness, group teaching, departmental and school policy, and something else.

You're right that it's subjective, but I've seen a lot of PhD students teach and been in the position myself, so I'm happy to answer. It is a 'how long is a piece of string' type of question. Some PhD students found it did distract from their PhD, but this was because they spent a lot of time prepping (I would argue too much time). Initially, I found I spent a lot of time prepping, but this was because I was a new teacher who had not built up that bank of resources and had little knowledge of what to expect from my class. As I went on, though, the time I spent preparing lessons dropped quite dramatically to a maximum of two hours per session (and that was rare to spend that long). That was because I'd built up a library of resources and knew what to expect from my students. In my busiest year, I was teaching around 6 hours per week (with one or two weeks reaching 10 hours); this, I should add, is rather unusual. To combat this having any effect on my PhD, I basically would plan on the weekends and would spend little time during the week on any teaching prep barring replying to any student emails. I found then that this had no effect on my PhD and those whom it did affect tended to use teaching as an excuse to avoid doing any PhD work. The only time it did affect my research was during marking, but again once you've done that once or twice, you know what to expect. I'm happy to answer any further questions you may have.

PhD teaching assistant at UoB

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