Pali administration made the executive decision to eliminate the teacher assistant (TA) course in the 2024-25 school year. This change has been met with adverse reactions from faculty and students.
In the past, TAs supported Pali instructors with various classroom tasks, including organizing papers, grading assignments and providing overall support to teachers.
According to Pali Career Technical Education coordinator David Pickard, TAs were removed due to a combination of vacant classes and students having little to do when being a TA.
“TAs often had nothing to do [and would be] wandering around halls,” he said. “Classes had too many spots, and not enough students.”
Pickard explained how eliminating the TA course option was the best option to effectively prioritize student learning.
“Enrollment was low [and] the decision was that [administrators] wanted kids sitting in academic classes, not in teacher’s classrooms unengaged,” he said.
Conversely, Advanced Placement World History teacher Steven Burr argued that TAs have assisted him throughout his 28 years of teaching.
“We have always had service workers, and [administration] changed the process without any [faculty] input whatsoever,” Burr said. “The loss of TAs in the past two weeks has hurt my class tremendously because I’m doing administrative tasks as opposed to greeting my students daily.”
Burr explained that while TAs have been removed, administration still has assistants.
“If [administration] believes that teachers don’t need service workers, they don’t need office assistants,” he added.
Senior Bradley Chang said that he served as a TA in past years but was rejected when he re-applied this school year.
“It was upsetting that this year I couldn’t TA for my old history teacher,” he said. “I was really looking forward to it.”
Chang also believes that TAs provide numerous benefits for teachers.
“My job last year made it so my teacher could focus on teaching, and not have to do all the stuff on the side, [which] helped with efficiency,” Chang said.
Burr has developed his own solution to alleviate his workload by creating a system where assistants can work for community service.
“I reached out to students to see if anyone was willing to do work for community service… grading at nutrition, lunch and 7th period,” he said.
While the decision to remove TAs has been met with various reactions, administration says that they are working on addressing them.
As the former AP Psychology and 9th-grade Social Justice and Law pod teacher, Pickard explained that he “personally [understands] the frustration that comes from not having TA support.”
Pickard added that teachers are making individual efforts in response to the administration’s decision regarding the removal of TAs.
“Student tutors in the Study Center are always here to help, and teachers are working on reorganizing their classes to work in a different way,” he said.
