Steps for Starting Your Program

Additional Tips

Here is some helpful advice on starting and running a program.    

• 1. Start in one or two departments or disciplines and then build the program so that it is responsive to your school context and to establish norms for the program. 

  2. LAs should be positioned as elite among undergraduate math and science students. This will help with setting departmental and university norms of valuing scholarly teaching for faculty and for students. Consider the motto: “Oh, so you understand math and science…but can you teach it?”

  3. In the initial stages it's important to have one or two people who are dedicated to organizing all aspects of program.  If possible, find another faculty member, assistant or graduate student to help as soon as possible. Whether it is a small percentage of the departmental administrator’s time, another faculty member, a graduate student, a master teacher, or a post-doctoral scholar, it is helpful to have someone to work with. 

  4. Institute all three main LA activities up front (LA-led small groups, faculty-LA weekly planning meetings and a Science, Math, Engineering Education course); once norms are set they are hard to change. Also, decide early whether stipends, wages, and/or credit will be used as compensation for the LAs’ time. Again, once norms are set they are hard to change. 

  5. Be intentional about how LAs will use their time. Remember that this experience should be of value to all who participate (faculty, LAs, enrolled students). In order for the model to take hold, all participants must feel valued by others and they must feel that their experiences are of personal value. 

  6. LA-supported sessions should have direct and obvious value to enrolled students. Recitation sessions or other sessions that are run by LAs should be either required, or content discussed in these sessions should be clearly included on chapter exams. Students often measure what instructors value by what is placed on the exam.