Departmental Self Review - UCLA Academic Senate

students who are seen to be underperforming in the program. 2 Specific student suggestions toenhance the quality of advising and mentorship included:• Greater attention to the role of advising in the post-MA period and the possibility ofannual mini-conferences to keep more advanced students on track.• Greater attention to formal flow of information from faculty to students particularly inthe form of written summaries from student reviews. 3• Greater attention to preparing students for jobs, both inside and outside of academia.Student Stipends: Students agree that the current procedure of offering multi-year fundingpackages to all incoming students is working well. One student writes, "I think the funding isgreat. I really like that the department accepts few enough people to support well and I lovethat there is not a climate of competition." Another student comments, "My experience withfunding has been excellent." One student has suggested that the current approach to fundinghurts the ability of the department to attract the best students; in essence the forced equity infunding packages means that there is no room to offer "top dollar" to recruit the most soughtafter students. This student recommended that !1 small pot of money should be set aside toenhance certain individual funding packages to improve recruitment results.Teaching Assistantships: Students are concerned about variability in both the workloads andexpectations for TAs. It is suggested that classes (particularly the large lower division classes)need to be standardized in terms of the nature and quantity of assignments. There is also someconcern that the degree to which faculty oversee the activities of theirTAs varies too widely. ffione instance, a concern was raised that discussion sections should not be used to introduce newinformation, but should be exclusively a forum for review and discussion.Support for Student Research: While students generally feel financially well supported withinthe program, some have stressed a need for more research money distributed on a competitivebasis. Two students requested that the department decouple the Post-fieldwork Data AnalysisFellowship, offered competitively within the department, from the Dissertation YearFellowship, offered by Graduate Division. These students saw the current requirement thatData Analysis fellows apply for the Dissertation Year Fellowship as potentially favoring timeto-degreeissues over quality of research and preparedness for the job market.2 Concern with this issue stems from two cases in the 2005-2006 academic year where students wereadvised that they would not be accepted into the PhD program following the completion of their MAtheses.3 This would only impact students before they advance to candidacy, since students who have advancedare no longer reviewed by the faculty as a whole.20