Teaching Requirements

All Ph.D. students in English are required to complete one semester each of grading, serving as a Teaching Assistant (TAing), and teaching a One Series course as the instructor of record. Students are not required to teach in years 1, 3, and 5. 

Year 2

In their second year, Ph.D. students serve for one semester as a grader for a lecture course or medium-sized seminar and for one semester as a teaching assistant for a large lecture course.

TAships and Graderships are longstanding opportunities for pedagogical training provided by the English for graduate students. Our Gradership Guidelines outlines duties and expectations of graders, and our TA Guidelines outlines the duties and expectations of teaching assistants. 

As graders, students gain hands-on experience providing effective feedback on undergraduate research and writing. Students also work closely with the faculty instructor to observe pedagogical practices, gaining an understanding of how courses are designed and articulated and familiarity with the field or topic of the class. 

As teaching assistants, students gain experience providing instruction, fostering discussion, designing and grading assignments, and managing other course administration. TAs attend all lectures during the week and then deliver a recitation to their own sections on Fridays.

These teaching assignments are built into the Ph.D. program and are conditions of the five-year funding packages, meaning that they don't include additional compensation. They are also treated as foundational learning experiences, and they come with extensive pedagogical training and support from faculty and peer advisors.

In the semester in which they TA, students will enroll in ENGL 8000, Pedagogy, taught by the instructor of the lecture course. This class functions partly as a TA meeting but also includes assignments to develop teaching skills, such as reading theoretical works about pedagogy. This course also guides students through preparing sample syllabi and a teaching philosophy statement in preparation for later teaching and the job market. 

Years 3 & 4

In the spring semester of their third year, Ph.D. students take a workshop to prepare to teach their One Series course. The One Series (TOS) courses are a requirement of the English major, which means that all of our majors need to take at least one TOS section to complete the major. These seminars are designed to provide a semester-long in-depth study of a major work. With enrollment caps of approximately eight students, TOS courses address emergent research methods, advanced writing and critical thinking skills, and debates surrounding canonization. The selected work at the core of each TOS serves as both hub and entry point. Students will use it as a way to gain new access to a range of other primary and secondary texts, and to learn different ways that works can be interrogated, studied, questioned, reassessed. The TOS Workshop prepares students by having them submit course titles, course descriptions, syllabus drafts, and assignments for faculty and peer review, and by providing guidance on course admin and organization. 

In their fourth year, Ph.D. students teach their TOS course. All TOS instructors are observed by the year’s TOS Faculty Director and TOS Graduate Mentor, and meet regularly to discuss their seminar’s progress and any issues that arise.

General 

In addition to the pedagogical training and support offered by the department, Ph.D. students are encouraged to take advantage of Penn’s Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETLI), which hosts workshops, mini-courses, and informational sessions about various topics in university teaching. CETLI can also arrange for a graduate fellow to observe a class session and offer feedback. After teaching their TOS, rising fifth-year Ph.D. students are eligible to be nominated for the CETLI Graduate Fellowship.

In cases where Ph.D. students in good academic standing want to take on additional work through teaching, TAing, or grading, they should discuss the feasibility and appropriateness of the work in question with their advisors. Whenever possible, additional work should contribute to the student’s career training. International students should also consult their Penn ISSS advisor about whether their visa allows them to take on additional work. 

In cases where the department seeks to hire additional graders or TAs, an announcement with a description of the position, eligibility requirements, evaluation criteria, and deadlines will be shared with all English graduate students. The gradership guidelines outline the procedures the English Department uses for determining which courses will be assigned graders in a given semester.