While it is rare that a student is required to pass more than one language class before being allowed to hold a TAship, fields must be aware of this possibility. Currently, the ITAP may require up to four classes: EDUC 5780, EDUC 5790, ALS 5800, and ALS 5810. A student who has not fulfilled the requirement will either have to have some other form of support or will not be able to register. We encourage fields to inform students of the mandate at the time of admission if the field anticipates assigning a TAship at any point during the degree program.

Continuing Students
Continuing graduate students who anticipate TAing for the first time, and who have not yet been screened by the ITAP, should be screened immediately so that they can enroll in language classes, if required, before assuming their TAship. Screening interviews can be scheduled by contacting the Center for Teaching Excellence at 607-255-3990.

Entering Graduate Students
Graduate students who have been assigned a TAship for their first semester at Cornell are further required to participate in the Summer International TA Program.

The provost will continue to cover the cost of this instructional program but departments will again be asked to provide the $500 stipend for participants. The financial responsibility for the stipend lies with the department for which the graduate student will be teaching.

The following groups of students are considered automatically exempt from the Summer ITAP:

• Citizens and permanent residents of countries whose first language is English. This exemption does not extend to regions of such countries where the official language is not English. Thus, among the automatically exempt are students from English-speaking Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and the UK. Among those not exempt automatically are students from the Indian subcontinent, Singapore, the Anglophone Caribbean, Anglophone Africa, Francophone Canada, and Puerto Rico.
• Students who have already been exempted by the ITAP staff based on a screening interview.
• Students who have successfully completed EDUC 5780 and have not been required to enroll in further language classes.
• Students who have completed at least three years of undergraduate and/or graduate study at an institution where the official language of instruction is English. Such students are exempt from the summer program but are still required to participate in an ITAP screening interview and may be required to enroll in language classes before they can assume a TA assignment.
  

• Students who do not get their visas in time to participate in the program.
• Students who have to miss part of the program due to an emergency or other hardship.

The Graduate School and the Center for Teaching Excellence are happy to work with fields, departments, colleges, and other units in their efforts to implement their own TA training programs in a spirit of shared responsibility for excellence in teaching at Cornell. Units interested in developing their own programs that will both meet the goals of the ITAP and will provide discipline-specific instruction are encouraged to contact the Dean of the Graduate School for guidelines and additional information on mandatory content for ITA training.

Attached please find a sample letter to entering international students who are required to enroll in the Summer ITAP. Please include this text in your offer letter or another early mailing to those students who will TA in their first semester at Cornell. We are also requesting that the offer letter you send specify clearly the kind of appointment you are extending (TA, RA, GRA), so that we may avoid confusion over which students will be required to attend the mandatory summer training program for TAs. Students should be informed that they must successfully complete the summer program in order to hold a TAship in the Fall semester. Award letters should always state that funding is contingent not only on academic progress but also upon satisfactory performance in any teaching or research assignments.

You will find information on the program and its content through the Center for Teaching Excellence Web site: www.cte.cornell.edu. Background information on the Provost's mandate can be accessed through the Graduate School's website: www.gradschool.cornell.edu. Should you have additional questions about the ITAP mandate, please contact Associate Dean J. Ellen Gainor (e-mail; 255-7374). For questions about the ITAP summer program, please contact the Center for Teaching Excellence (255-6310). Thank you for your ongoing cooperation with this important graduate student training program.

Sample letter for entering international teaching assistants

Dear student name:

Congratulations on your admission for graduate study in field name at Cornell, and congratulations on the offer of a Teaching Assistantship for the Fall semester. Serving as a teaching assistant is both rewarding and challenging. To help international teaching assistants prepare for these responsibilities, Cornell offers a summer training program through the International Teaching Assistant Program (ITAP) of the Center for Teaching Excellence (CTE). Below please find important information about the Summer ITAP.

Participation
Participation in the ITAP summer program is mandatory for all international students from countries where English is not the first language and who plan to serve as teaching assistants in their first semester of study. Students receive a stipend of $500 for participation in the ITAP summer program.

Post-Program Assessment
At the conclusion of the program, students participate in an assessment interview to determine readiness to be a teaching assistant. Students who participate in the ITAP summer program may still require additional language instruction or may still not be ready to teach. Students who do not demonstrate sufficient language skill or readiness to teach during the assessment interview will not be allowed to serve as teaching assistants.

Housing
Students signed up for on-campus university housing during the academic year may be able to move into assigned housing early as Aug. 1, if availability allows. To be considered for on-campus housing, complete and submit a housing application as soon as possible. Housing is not guaranteed and is assigned according to the date the housing application is received at the Housing Office. All on-campus housing options can be viewed via the web at www.campuslife.cornell.edu. Off campus housing options can be viewed at offcampus.campuslife.cornell.edu.

ITADP Summer Program Web site
http://cte.cornell.edu/campus/itadp/summer.html

We look forward to your arrival in Ithaca this summer.

Sincerely,
DGS name