Hitting on and getting hit on by undergrads

80Chris
Tue, 31 Jan 2012 02:23:44 +0000

Nice thread! I should really be reading other things instead of this thread, haha… Honest request for advice follows… first some background:

I’m a grad student, late-20s. She’s a non-traditional university student, mid-20s undergraduate. Well, now I’m her TA. She’s pretty mature and quite enthusiastic to talk to me–though I honestly try to keep my conversation vague for all the obvious TA-student power relations and so on. Heck, maybe she is interested in manipulating me for a grade, how do I know…I don’t.

All of this nonsense about “Can I date an undergrad I TA for?” is pure delusion. Of course you cannot–beyond ethics, I’m almost certain its university policy (whether the said Grad realizes it or not). That said, I think its absurd to set arbitrary policies for oneself, e.g. “Don’t date within the department,” surely the characters in question are IN the same department because they share some similar interests–a much better start to a date than picking up at a random bar. So not interested in any lectures on why I shouldn’t consider pursuing this.

So here’s my practical question: how, after I no longer TA for her, after waiting reasonable time, and so on and so forth, could I proceed to ask this woman out in a non-shady manner?

I’m obviously not going to “stalk” her in order to set up some “random” encounter. Nor am I willing to twiddle my thumbs while I wait to just “run” into her at the farmers market (…or wherever it is people run into each other…). So what gives…do I use her university email to contact her? Isn’t that a bit bizarre? Who asks a person out over email for crying out loud? Are there other options?

Thanks for any suggestions.