Exchange Teaching Assistants?

Even for the most adventurous undergraduates, spending a year in a foreign country can be as intimidating as it is exciting. But spending a year in a foreign country, as both an undergraduate and a teacher, would seem to kick the intimidation factor up a few notches.

But for Marion Fabing, a French exchange student who is spending the equivalent of her senior year here at Tufts, inhabiting the dual roles of teacher and student is far more satisfying than it is frightening.

"I'd spent time in the States during high school," said Fabing, who attends the University La Sorbonne Nouvelle in France. "I wanted to come back and check out the American college life."

Faber is one of several undergraduate exchange students who serve as a Teaching Assistants (TAs) in the University's language departments during their tenure at Tufts.

"We have a few undergraduate TAs who lead discussion groups for our foreign language classes," French Language Coordinator Emese Soos said of the University's Romance Languages Department. "These students are native speakers of one of the languages we teach -- French, Italian, Spanish."

"Basically, we're looking for leaders," Spanish Language Coordinator Marta Rosso-O'Laughlin said.

Although undergraduate TAs are rare in the Spanish department, only two graduate student TAs were hired this semester, allowing undergraduates to fill the remaining positions. "We don't usually employ undergraduate students [as TAs]...," Rosso-O'Laughlin said. "More of our TAs are exchange students from Madrid or Chile who have completed their degree in their native countries."

One TA who did acquire a teaching assistant position in the Spanish department is Mario Santos-Sousa, a student at the Autonomous University of Madrid who is spending his senior year at Tufts.

Santos-Souza leads eight 40-minute conversation groups per week and is a native speaker of Spanish-- a requirement in order to be a TA in the Spanish Department.

Fabing, like Santos-Sousa, also leads eight 40-minute conversation groups per week. She became interested in working as a teaching assistant overseas during her studies in France.

"At my school, La Sorbonne Nouvelle, I went to see what [overseas French TA] positions were available," she said. "There were two - one at Tufts, and one at Middlebury. I applied for both, though I really wanted Tufts!"

The process of becoming a foreign language TA is very competitive. Faber competed for the Tufts position with two other students just at her university. Sara D'Armayan, another undergraduate French teaching assistant, also competed with three other students at her university.

In addition to their roles as TAs, both students also serve as French Exchange Instructors. In that capacity, Fabing and D'Armayan help to organize events within the French Department and communicate with their fellow French exchange students.

The responsibilities held by each language department's TAs are similar.

"In French [classes], the TAs are expected to discuss the news in French with students, who are supposed to have listened to French news via television or the Internet," Soos said. Similar discussions occur in Spanish conversation groups.

"The main issue is to make [the students] speak in Spanish," Santos-Sousa said. "[The students] don't like debates because they have to talk a lot!"

"The main goal is to improve their oral skills," Fabing concurred. "English is not allowed."

Fabing knows the value of participating in conversation groups with native language-speakers firsthand. While she studied in France, her own interactions with native English speakers were very helpful in developing her command of the English language.

"I hope that a lot more universities [have conversation groups]," Faber said. "I studied English in France, and we had native [English] speakers from England, Scotland, and sometimes the United States at La Sorbonne."

According to Fabing, her interactions with those native English-speakers were invaluable. In fact, she wished she'd had the opportunity to have more of them: "It really wasn't enough," she said.

In addition to providing exchange students with a valuable experience -- and Tufts students with the chance to engage in dialogue with native speakers of the languages they are studying --, serving as a TA provides exchange students with financial benefits.

"I'm an exchange student, so I don't pay Tufts' tuition," Fabing said. "Unlike a lot of other exchange students, though, since I teach I actually get paid!"

But acquiring a job as an exchange student is often extremely difficult. The Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (BCIS) restricts exchange students' from most off-campus work opportunities. With few exceptions, the BCIS does not grant any off-campus work permission within an exchange student's first academic year in the U.S.

The BCIS, does, however, allow some exchange students to pursue part-time on-campus employment (20 hours or less per week) during the semester. During the summer, students are permitted to work full-time as long as their jobs involve scholarships, fellowships, or assistantships. Before seeking employment of any sort, exchange students must consult with the University's International Center.

Fabing is most grateful for the chance to serve as a TA, though, simply for the experience of teaching. "I've thought about becoming a teacher," she said. "I'm not sure yet, but becoming a TA gives me an idea of what being a teacher would be like."

For Santos-Sousa, the best part of being a TA is also the experience he's gained. "[The time commitment] is worth it," he said, adding that the students he teaches - all eighty of them - "are good kids."

"The foreign assistance program, giving us the opportunity to study here and to live like real American college students, is wonderful," Fabing added. "I'm very grateful."

Yet there is one aspect of being TAs that both Santos-Souza and Fabing are still in the process of mastering: remembering all of their students' names. "Finally, they're starting to stick in my head," Faber said, smiling.