Credits Required for GIs

How many credits do I need to take in order to be a GI? 

To teach classes as a Graduate Instructor, the Grad School requires that you be a full-time matriculated student. However, for GIs that does not mean taking 9 credits per semester. If you are a GI with a teaching workload of 15 or more hours per week, you are considered a full-time student if you take at least six graduate credits during the semester. In the English Department, we define the first class you teach as 15 hours (.375 time), and the second class you teach as an additional 5 hours for a total of 20 hours (.500 time). Our thinking is that preparing for one class takes almost as much time as preparing for two sections of the same class. This definition also allows students to take six credits (as opposed to nine) when they are teaching only one class as a GI.

If you have completed all your coursework and have only three credits of Thesis left to complete your 30 credits for the degree, and if your Master's Program of Study form or Doctoral Program of Study Form has been approved, the Grad School will consider you a full-time student when you take just three credits. That means you will be allowed to teach two sections as a GI while taking only three credits of Thesis. If you choose to exercise this option, you should notify the Grad School to be sure that they know you are doing so and agree that you are eligible.

You will not be eligible for this option if you still need to take seminars to complete your Program of Study. Nor will you be eligible if you have more than three credits of Engl. 6970 (Thesis) remaining. For instance, suppose you are beginning your final academic year and you have completed all your seminar work, needing only six credits of Engl. 6970 to finish your Plan A thesis. If you were not teaching, you could take three of those Thesis credits in fall and the other three in spring. However, if you want to teach as a GI both those semesters, the Grad School would require you to register for an additional three graduate credits in the fall.