Assistantships

Graduate teaching and research assistantships are available for degree-seeking students in many of the academic departments at The University of Memphis. These positions require 3-20 hours of service per week and the student's home academic unit provides most of the assistantship opportunities for the student. Graduate assistants must maintain a minimum 3.00 GPA to keep their assistantships. International students may encounter additional items specific to their F-1 status that may affect their assistantship plans. F-1 students should thoroughly check all details on any graduate assistantship position offer and ask questions when they arise.

Graduate assistants who work at least 10 hours per week are classified as in-state students for tuition and fee-paying purposes for the duration of their assistantship. Students with a graduate assistantship can be eligible for a scholarship equal to the amount of tuition.

Students should prepare well in advance of their first day working at the assistantship by obtaining a United States Social Security Number. Obtaining a Social Security Number can take several weeks and can only be requested after arriving in the United States.

Graduate teaching assistants must have a master's degree in the teaching discipline or have 18 graduate credit hours in the discipline. Teaching assistants can only teach undergraduate courses unless they are approved by the Dean of the Graduate School to teach upper-level courses. They may not teach more than 6 hours of for-credit courses without prior approval from the Dean of the Graduate School. Graduate assistants will be directly supervised by a faculty member and have regular in-service training and planned and periodic evaluations.

Non-native English speakers must also pass the SPEAK test before they can be appointed as teaching assistants. Students should contact the International Student Services Office for information on when the SPEAK test is administered.