<p>Most of the math and engineering posters here should try dropping by the Psych department sometime. I am a male TA in psych, with classes that have female to male ratios of around 10:1, and I am constantly just a little bit paranoid about saying the wrong thing and getting myself into some kind of trouble. It also does not help that all my most attractive students have the highest grades and it has NOTHING to do with me, as those grades are from the section taught by the professor, and are multiple choice and marked by a scantron machine. </p>
<p>Also I have more than a few type A personality students who visit my office constantly trying to get some hidden secret to getting a better grade, and in most of their cases I have to work really really hard to ignore their appearance (give me a break I work like 65 hours a week and am surrounded by them most of that time). PLUS there are a total of 16 TA’s in my department, (including me) of whom myself and about 4 others are unmarried. </p>
<p>I know this is kind of an old thread, but I had to put my two cents in. I’m dating (seriously, I might add) a man who was my TA this past semester. We started dating toward the end of the course, though we kept it very quiet. Heck, were still not really openly dating (though the majority of people know) because we’re in the same department and that could be awkward for him.</p>
<p>But neither one of us planned it. It’s not like I walked into the class and thought “hey, he’s hot, I should try and pick him up”. No, we fell in love over the course of the semester as we interacted both in and out of class (we both frequent a local hangout and would run into each other a lot.) The way you all talk about dating seems so predatory to me. Like you’re on the lookout for anyone you could snatch up, as opposed to getting to know someone and falling for them in an organic and gradual way. No one who was in that class with me would ever suggest that there was some sexual harassment involved in developing our relationship, or that there was any bias in my grading (though it helps that I was also obviously really good at the subject and tutored many of my peers) because it was obviously something that couldn’t be helped. You can’t control who you develop feelings for, and while I do suggest waiting until the course is completed (this particular grad student was the only instructor for the class, and it was sometimes awkward during lecture, because we tried really hard to wait, but just couldn’t), I don’t think there is anything at all wrong with grad students dating undergrads, even those within their department, when the relationship develops this way. I think these things should be judged on a case-by-case basis. There are TAs who take advantage of their position of power, and attractive undergrads who try and get good grades by flirting. But it is not always the case. Sometimes people just fall in love. And sometimes the resulting relationships do work. Ben and I are planning on getting married someday. And no one will care that I was at one point his student.</p>
<p>Apparently, phichick missed the entire point of avoiding TA-student relationships until after the semester is over. Even if there are no allegations of sexual harassment between you and him, someone else can complain, or allege that he treated you differently, and still put him into a very bad place. If anyone does complain, a natural question will be: did phichick receive better grades because they were dating at the time? Did their relationship influence his decisions at all? If so, he could still lose his funding (today or in the future), or worse yet be thrown out of graduate school for breaching the college’s no-fraternization policy.</p>
<p>If you want to date a TA, then wait until at least a few months AFTER the semester is over to even initiate contact. Otherwise, you place yourself both in a position for potential pain later on down the line.</p>
<p>As others have stressed, no NOTHING with any of your current students.</p>
<p>Beyond that, show some class. Consider social invitations from undergrads but don’t initiate them. Be mindful of age differences. A 24 year old grad student dating a 22 year old Senior is OK, a 28 year old grad student hanging around the Freshman dorms is creepy.</p>
<p>Nice thread! I should really be reading other things instead of this thread, haha… Honest request for advice follows… first some background:</p>
<p>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. </p>
<p>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. </p>
<p>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? </p>
<p>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?</p>