While MSU teaching assistants confront the unemployment line, the university should not get sidetracked by the grumbling of its soon-to-be ex-workers. While TAs are no doubt a valuable aspect of a college education, budget concerns must remain centered around this school's top priority - its students.
It was announced Wednesday that only a portion of TAs from the College of Arts & Letters would be invited back to teach at the university in the fall. Similar cuts are occurring within the foreign language programs, departments that depend heavily on TA-led courses.
Of course, we are saddened to see TAs go. Many students find it easier to relate to graduate student instructors who often are closer in age to their pupils than most professors. Many TAs are able to pump energy and excitement into the courses they teach.
Graduate students from across the country and around the globe provide diversity and world savvy to our Midwestern institution, and with less TA positions available, they might not be able to fund their educations.
But giving TAs the sack equates to more than a longer bread line. We can't help but selfishly consider how these cutbacks signify an all-around downgrade in education for roughly 40,000 undergraduate students.
With TAs on the outs, students can expect to attend larger classes that will not delve as deeply into subject material. This will be an especially huge problem for foreign language courses, including those within the departments of French, Classics and Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. Learning a foreign language is difficult enough without being in a 300-person lecture hall.
And with fewer instructors, there won't be as many course sections available to students. This could have a devastating effect on the initiative to graduate college students in four years. When entire courses or sections become eliminated, students might be forced to delay post-graduation plans as they attempt to pick up straggling credits.
Yes, we feel for the TAs thrust back on the job market. But they're not the only victims here.
