Financial support is available to communication graduate students through teaching assistantships, in which graduate students assist instructors with courses or lead class sections. Teaching assistantships provide tuition remission for a specified period for both in-state and out-of-state students, as well as an academic-year stipend, and eligibility for low-cost health insurance for students and their families. Information about teaching assistantships and links to other UWM resources is available at Graduate School Types of Funding.
Students may also apply for various competitive fellowships through the Graduate School, and our graduate students have a strong record of success in securing these fellowships. Although similar to assistantships financially, the fellowships are especially attractive because they do not include the work obligations that characterize a teaching assistantship. Fellowship information and links to other UWM resources is available at Graduate School Types of Funding.
Graduate students may also apply for campus-wide scholarships in the UWM Panther Scholarship Portal. See instructions for how to apply.
Teaching Assistant Program
Communication teaching assistants are typically assigned to assist with or teach small sections of introductory courses in the Communication program or the Journalism, Advertising, and Media Studies (JAMS) program. Teaching assistantships provide tuition remission for a specified period for both in-state and out-of-state students, as well as an academic-year stipend, and eligibility for low-cost health insurance for students and their families. Teaching assistantships are for full-time study only.
Graduate program admission and teaching assistantships are competitive and determined separately based on the same admission criteria. To be considered for the initial round of teaching assistantship offers, applications should be submitted by the December 1 priority deadline the previous year and indicate interest in a teaching assistantship. Students must be admitted to the graduate program prior to being considered for an assistantship. Information about teaching assistantships, including current stipend levels, can be found on the Graduate School website. Please review the Graduate School Guidelines for the appointment of teaching assistants.
Purpose
The graduate teaching assistantship program provides teaching assistance to the department, as well as financial support and professional training to students. Teaching assistants are considered University employees with the responsibility to discharge the duties prescribed by the University and the Department of Communication. In return, the department will ensure that the teaching assistant has a valuable experience that develops skills relevant to undergraduate teaching in communication. When possible, students’ interests and preferences may be taken into consideration when assistantship assignments are made, but the constraints inherent in making teaching assistant assignment decisions necessitates prioritizing University and department needs over individual requests. Individual requests cannot be guaranteed.
Duties and Hours
MA and beginning PhD teaching assistants support instructors in in-person or online undergraduate courses or act as the primary instructors for small sections. Teaching assistants with a 50% appointment work approximately 20 hours per week, totaling 760 hours over the course of the academic year. Teaching assistants are required to register for and complete a minimum of six graduate credits per semester (with a lower minimum for advanced PhD students who are in dissertator status).
Note that the nature of a teaching assistantship is such that the weekly workload is somewhat variable across an academic semester, due to the timing of course assignments, quizzes, exams, and papers. As a result, there may be some weeks in which the workload exceeds the average time commitment, balanced by other weeks that do not reach that average. Because of this, the teaching assistant and their supervising faculty member should discuss the workload, including assignments and schedules, at the beginning of each semester, so that students may plan in advance.
Renewal of Teaching Assistantships
Teaching assistantship contracts cover one academic year at a time. A student’s assistantship will be renewed up to the number of years of funding specified in their original assistantship offer, contingent on satisfactory performance in their assistantship duties and satisfactory academic performance as a student in the graduate program. Pending budgetary approvals, MA students are typically renewed for up to two years of funding and PhD students up to four years of funding.