Academic Assistant Pre-Course Meeting Requirement

All Academic Assistants (AA) are required to meet with the instructor of record prior to the start of each new course. The purpose of this meeting is to:

  • Establish a clear communication plan between the Instructor/Faculty and Academic Assistant
  • Review the course structure, schedule, and expectations
  • Clarify the roles, responsibilities, and duties assigned to the Academic Assistant
  • Ensure alignment on strategies to support overall course management and student success

This meeting is essential for fostering collaboration, promoting efficiency, and creating a consistent, supportive learning environment for students.

It is strongly recommended this meeting by held by Zoom or by phone (at least for initial assignment with that faculty member).

Process

For each assignment, the AA will receive the pre-course meeting notification shortly after the AA submits their assignment confirmation.  The email will come from “Belinda Miller via Smartsheet.”

  • The AA will need to click the Open Request button in the email to view the topics that must be covered in the meeting.
  • During or after the meeting, the AA will need to respond to each of the questions and submit the responses.
    1. Some responses will have a checkbox, some will have dropdown options, and some will be free text in which the AA can just type in the response.
    2. Once all responses are done, it is recommended the AA check the box at the bottom (before submitting) to receive an emailed copy of the responses for their records.
    3. The AA is welcome to ask additional questions, but these won’t be included on the form submission.

For your reference, we have created a Word document containing all the topics and questions to be covered in the pre-course meeting.  You can find this document attached at the bottom of this page.

Follow-up Meetings

For AA and instructor follow-up meetings, please use the following link to record and submit the meeting content:  Follow-up Course Meeting.


AA Pre-Course Meeting Topics/Questions:

  • Date of Pre-course Meeting
  • Introduce yourself and learn about the professor
  • Be introduced to class or be a silent grader?
    1. -Instructor will introduce AA to class (AA needs to send instructor a short BIO)
    2. -AA will introduce yourself to the class
    3. -AA will be a silent grader
  • Who's 1st point of contact for students?
    1. -Always the AA
    2. -Always the instructor
    3. -Instructor for certain topics (type the topics in the next answer)
  • Topics, if any, students should contact instructor
  • Need course resources outside of Moodle?
    1. -Yes, textbook (Instructor will request access)
    2. -Yes, login access to external LMS (Instructor will request access)
    3. -No other resources needed
  • Review the syllabus & class schedule
  • Items AA will grade? Regularly scheduled?
  • Identify location of rubrics or grading guides
  • Do I need to participate in forums or just grade?
    1. -Participate
    2. -Grade/Feedback only
    3. -Both
  • How are discussions graded?
    1. -Whole forum grading
    2. -Ratings
    3. -Both whole forum & ratings
    4. -No forums
  • Should AA send weekly reminders? Preferred day?
  • Procedure for handling late work?
  • Instructor teaching philosophy, strict or lenient?
  • AA emails to students:
    1. -AA should copy instructor on all emails to students
    2. -AA should only copy instructor on email that might need instructor attention
  • Method & frequency of course check-ins
  • Instructor's preferred method of contact
    1. -Phone
    2. -Email
    3. -Text
    4. -Web meeting
  • Date of follow-up meeting, if applicable