Now in its 10th year, the Collaborative Teaching Initiative (CTI) has gained popularity among graduate students, particularly in the English Department. The program enables graduate students to co-design and co-teach an undergraduate course — typically a seminar or upper-level class — with a faculty member, providing graduate students with the opportunity to gain pedagogical and professional experience through courses that usually do not have teaching assistants.
The CTI was created in 2015 through the joint support of the Office of the Dean of the College (ODOC), the Graduate School, and the Dean of the Faculty, according to University spokesperson Jennifer Morrill. Morrill told The Daily Princetonian that despite fluctuations from year to year, the number of applications has increased since the program began.
CTI courses often align with graduate students’ research interests. English graduate student Mi Yu GS was asked to co-teach the course ENG 472: The Marriage Plot with professor Maria DiBattista because the course material corresponded with Yu’s interests in domestic fiction and the Victorian novel.
“[DiBattista] said she’s excited to teach the Victorian novel, because typically, she works on the modernist novels, and I’m just happy I get to teach what my research is on,” Yu said in an interview with the ‘Prince.’
Many graduate students expressed that they find value in the ability to develop the path of their own course, as compared to the more limited role of a teaching assistant. Piper Winkler GS, an English graduate student currently co-teaching ENG 344/GSS 343: Topics in Romanticism — Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley with Professor Susan Wolfson, compared her experience as a teaching assistant to that as a co-instructor.
“I had a lot of opportunities to work with students in my precepts in ways that I thought made sense, but it’s completely different when you get to just decide the structure of the class,” Winkler said in an interview with the ‘Prince.’
Yu emphasized the creative freedom of designing the class itself through the CTI, in contrast with precepts where teaching assistants aren’t “responsible for the syllabus.”
Yu and Winkler also expressed their appreciation for support provided by their mentors through the CTI. Winkler stated that Professor Wolfson gives her a lot of freedom to direct class conversations, and both Winkler and Yu said that they frequently brainstorm ideas with the professors with whom they co-teach.
Yu also co-taught AMS 425/ENG 423: Reality/Television with Professor William Gleason in Spring 2024. In its course reviews, many students described their learning experience as positive.
“Professor Gleason and Mi create a really wonderful seminar environment that challenges your thinking and encourages you to teach and learn from your peers,” a comment on the registrar’s semesterly course evaluations page stated.
The CTI is currently limited to graduate students in the humanities and social sciences. According to Morrill, there are currently no plans to extend this initiative to the natural sciences or engineering departments.
While the CTI is limited, offering 14 opportunities to regularly-enrolled graduate students and 14 to graduate students in dissertation completion enrollment status, it still provides significant opportunities for graduate students to lead course instruction and gain pedagogical experience.
“In Princeton, if we didn’t have the co-teaching program, there are actually very few ways for you to be able to actually get hands-on experience designing a syllabus,” Yu stated.
Wolfson differentiated the CTI from the traditional precepting experience, noting that with the former, graduate students are able to form “a dynamic relationship with a professor who is in the field to which you aspire to find employment.”
“Getting such an intensive, involved pedagogical experience is going to set me up in a really exciting way, and it’s already made me even more excited about the teaching process in the future,” Winkler said.
Julie Kim is a staff News writer for the ‘Prince.’ She is from Northvale, N.J. and can be reached at julie-kim[at]princeton.edu.
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
Editor’s note: This piece has been updated to clarify that student feedback came from course reviews.
Read More
With Cloister Inn closed, 111 students left without immediate eating club placement
Justus Wilhoit and Luke GrippoThe large number of unplaced students stands in contrast to recent years, where all or almost all students were placed in clubs. The ‘Prince’ gathered data from each club to break down the details.
The large number of unplaced students stands in contrast to recent years, where all or almost all students were placed in clubs. The ‘Prince’ gathered data from each club to break down the details.
Men’s basketball fails to finish comeback versus Penn as all-time series record is evened at 127 games apiece
Harrison Blank and Julian Hartman-SigallPrinceton falls to 4–4 in conference play as all-time series record versus Penn is evened at 127 games apiece.
Princeton falls to 4–4 in conference play as all-time series record versus Penn is evened at 127 games apiece.
This Week in History: Grades Lost in Transit
Miriam DubeWhile submitting an essay today often simply involves sending an email or hitting submit on Canvas, this wasn't always the case. This week in history, the ‘Prince’ explores an incident from 1985 in which a German professor lost his students’ final papers, and left University officials scrambling to find a satisfactory way to assign final grades to the students involved.