Graduate Student Workload Guidelines

Guiding Principles

Workload for all graduate assistants at UConn must be within the terms set out in the Graduate Employee Union contract, as specified in its Workload section.

Specific duties will necessarily vary widely across a college as diverse as CLAS. To the extent possible, workload should be equitable, so that graduate assistants with equivalent levels of appointments are working the appropriate number of hours, whether they are primary instructors of record, lab assistants, teaching assistants for lecture sections, teaching coordinators/graders.

Ensuring that the funding for GAs is supporting our teaching mission appropriately and efficiently.

The GEU contract specifies that the workload for a full-time graduate assistant “shall not exceed an average of twenty (20) hours per week during the term of the GA’s appointment” (Article 10, workload).
Workload may vary somewhat over the course of the appointment but should not “unreasonably exceed twenty (20) hours, or the pro rata equivalent, in any given week.”
All required work, including training, attending lectures, office hours, conferences with students or instructors of record, teaching and preparation, grading, answering emails, laboratory preparation and clean-up, and course administration must be considered when assigning workload.
Since the amount of time spent on tasks such as grading papers and preparing for class can vary greatly, departments might consider establishing norms for specific tasks. If the workload required for a GA assignment requires more than 20 hours a week on average, the department should address the problem; strategies might include training to expedite grading, developing some self-graded assignments, reducing the number of assignments, developing clear expectations around responding to email, or similar.
Department heads are responsible for ensuring that the GA workload accords with the contract, in coordination with individuals directly responsible for the course or program.