Student Perceptions of Undergraduate Teaching Assistants

As class sizes increase due to stagnating budgets, and as colleges and universities around the nation increase enrollment, more faculty (especially those without graduate students) are turning to undergraduate teaching assistants (UTA) to meet the increasing demands on academia. We surveyed 142 students enrolled in courses that utilized UTAs to discover what UTA characteristics played the most significant role in student perceptions of UTA helpfulness, accessibility, and perceived qualifications. We found a significant relationship between UTA teaching characteristics and these three main target variables. We recommend ideal UTA characteristics as well as propose a method for designing and implementing training programs for UTAs.