International teaching assistants from China, Korea and Vietnam crowded into the small kitchen of Hilary Farrell's '05 apartment on Nov. 19, learning how to make pumpkin pie. The event was organized by Farrell and other undergraduate consultants working with foreign graduate students to improve their English communication skills.
"Having an interactive way of learning about American culture rather than just watching TV, I think, is incredibly helpful for them," Farrell said.
The Thanksgiving dinner was an informal event that brought together six international graduate students and four undergraduate "consultants" working for the English for International Teaching Assistants program.
Nearly 40 percent of the 432 graduate students serving as teaching assistants or teaching classes at Brown this semester are international students.
"Students come at it from a consumer rights aspect because they might have a TA who isn't in control of the culture or language," said John Eng-Wong, director of foreign students at the Third World Center. "The ITAs are in a very vulnerable position here."
The ITA program works to respond to this need for English instruction. Farrell and 10 other undergraduate consultants for the ITA program meet twice weekly with ITAs to help them practice their English speaking skills.
"Undergraduates are the pillar of our program," said Jill Scott, an English instructor with the ITA program.
The ITA Program began in 1992, when the university made it a policy to ensure that international TAs have the skills necessary to teach, said Barbara Gourlay, the program's coordinator.
The program evaluates foreign graduate students based on an English proficiency evaluation. A panel composed of an undergraduate student, an English as a second language professional and a department representative evaluates how well each graduate student interacts in a teaching environment based on a presentation.
The program is then responsible for matching the student with an ITA English course.
"The roles and responsibilities for teaching are different than casual conversation," Gourlay said.
Around 60 foreign graduate students are taking courses with the ITA program this semester. The courses span across five levels of proficiency and focus on oral communication skills such as pronunciation and delivering information effectively in a classroom setting.
Another option for foreign graduate students is the English Language and Acculturation Seminar, a three-week program in August designed to help foreign TAs get accustomed to life in Providence before the academic year begins.
"Some of these students step off a plane from Beijing on Saturday and are expected to teach a class on Monday," said Scott, who coordinated the program.
This summer, 21 graduate students in the chemistry, physics and math departments participated in the three-week seminar, which expanded upon a 10-day pilot program held last year.
"As a teacher who has a lot of foreign TAs, the August program has been a good investment," said Joan Lusk, associate professor of chemistry. Lusk helped facilitate the summer ITA program this year and said the experience helped her establish close communication with the 12 international TAs she is working with this semester.
Some graduate students seek out individual help. Weiye Li, a second-year economics graduate student from China, works one-on-one with Gourlay to improve her pronunciation skills. "At the beginning it's kind of tough," Li said of her experience as a TA for an introductory economics course. "It's not only the language skill; it's explaining the logic behind things."
Of the 29 graduate student TAs in the economics department, 26 are international students.
"TAs with language problems are more comfortable giving technical answers than intuitive answers," said David Weil, graduate chair and professor in the economics department. "We assign the best teachers to the lowest-level courses."
An upper-level econometrics course is assigned an ITA with weaker English communication skills than an introductory course because undergraduates in the beginner course need clear explanations of basic concepts, he said.
Weil hopes next year's summer program will have enough funding to incorporate graduate students from the economics department. "If the University wants to improve the English skills of its graduate students, it just takes money and time," he said.
In addition to the summer program and ITA courses offered during the year, foreign students are encouraged to use resources provided by the Sheridan Center for Teaching and Learning.
Li is currently participating in a two-week program at the Sheridan Center that evaluates her teaching skills and provides her with instructions for improvement.
"I think personality makes a big difference - extending yourself to the students," Li said. "It's about delivering your experiences to them. It's kind of a long-term practice."
As printed, this article incorrectly reported that 40 percent of graduate students are not native speakers of English. Approximately 40 percent of graduate students are from outside of the United States, but not all of those students are non-native English speakers, as both the article and the headline reported. The University does not track how many graduate students speak English as a native language.
