TAs like me: Racial interactions between graduate teaching assistants and undergraduates

Abstract

The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research. NBER working papers are circulated for discussion and comment purposes. They have not been peerreviewed or been subject to the review by the NBER Board of Directors that accompanies official NBER publications.

Students are almost as effective as professors in university teaching

“…This effect is small compared to the impact of other determinants of student grades in the same environment, such as the 17 percent of a standard deviation grade premium received by students with the same nationality as their graders (Feld, Salamanca, & Hamermesh, 2016). The effect is also small compared to estimates from Lusher et al (2018), who find that Asian students' grades increase by 7.7 percent of a standard deviation when exposed to TAs of their own ethnicity.…”

“…Our paper relates to a few studies on how the origin and ethnicity of graduate teaching assistants (TAs) affect student performance. Lusher, Campbell, and Carrell (2018) find that students' grades increase when they are assigned to same-ethnicity graduate TAs. Borjas (2000) and Fleisher, Hishimoto and Weinberg (2002) study the effect of foreign-born graduate TAs, and reach opposing conclusions; Borjas (2000) finds that foreign-born TAs negatively affect student grades, whereas Fleisher et al (2002) find that they have negligible, or sometimes positive, effects on student grades.…”

Gender Grading Bias at Stockholm University: Quasi-Experimental Evidence From an Anonymous Grading Reform

“…See for instance Sandberg (2016). 4 See for instance Dee (2005Dee ( , 2007, Lee et al (2014), Lusher et al (2015), Feld et al (2016) and Lim and Meer (2017a) 5 A pilot study on the on parts of the sample was undertaken by Eriksson and Nolgren (2013) under the supervision of Björn Tyrefors Hinnerich.…”

“…Additionally, the effect of teachers as role models at the university level is investigated in Hoffmann and Oreopoulos (2009). Still other papers look at how the classroom gender composition affects student performance (Lee et al, 2014), how the matching of TA/teacher and student ethnicity/gender affects their performance (Lusher et al, 2015;Lim and Meer, 2017a;Lim and Meer, 2017b;Coenen and Van Klaveren, 2016) and whether biased grading seems to be driven by favoring your own type (endophilia) or by discriminating against other types (exophobia) (Feld et al, 2016).…”

Are Professors Worth It?

“…These studies have focused on the ethnicity and origin of graduate TAs. Lusher, Campbell, and Carrell (2018) study the role of graduate TAs' ethnicity and find that students' grades increase when they are assigned to same-ethnicity graduate TAs. Borjas (2000) and Fleisher, Hashimoto, and Weinberg (2002) study the effect of foreign-born as compared to native graduate TAs and reach opposing conclusions.…”