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If Harvard is serious about recentering academics, it needs to step up its standards for the people who actually teach.

I’m not talking about professors — I’m talking about teaching fellows, Harvard graduate students who assist with courses, often by running sections, grading exams and papers, and holding office hours. For Harvard to improve the educational experience, they should start with the people who handle the lion’s share of teaching.

Currently, the TF system is failing students and TFs alike. By employing graduate students to teach subjects they are not always expert in, Harvard is providing a suboptimal educational experience.

I am currently enrolled in a General Education course that covers the art and architecture of Armenia. Understandably, not a single one of the TFs for this course seems to study this country as their primary topic of scholarship. A friend of mine also recently shared with me that she has resorted to asking ChatGPT for help in one of her philosophy courses this semester because she feels that she and her TF are equally bewildered by the opaque readings. In both of our courses, the TF system fails to provide us with knowledgeable resources, and qualified graders.

There seem to be two main reasons for the flawed TF system. First, for courses in niche subjects, there often are not enough Ph.D. students at Harvard who are experts in the field of study to fully staff the course. Secondly, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Ph.D. students are often required — formally or economically — to teach courses, leading to a mad scramble for positions for which they may not be truly suited.

These issues will only get worse amidst a hiring freeze at Harvard and major cuts to Ph.D. programs here and nationwide. If the number of graduate students on this campus decreases, finding suitable TFs will only become more difficult.

The current TF system fails to consistently allocate graduate students to TF their area of study, leading to subpar instruction and frustrated students. Expectations fall across the board and students lose the incentive to invest in their courses because they recognize the small gap between their own knowledge and that of the TF. It is also unfortunate for the TFs, who are forced to teach subjects about which they are not passionate and have little specialized knowledge.

In my experience students particularly feel this frustration in course sections, facilitated by TFs. Sections often review what was mentioned in the lecture, with little added depth. This surface-level knowledge leads to busywork assignments and a watered-down educational experience. I have had sections which consistently ended early because there simply is not enough content to fill the time.

Simple solutions to rectify this system abound. For courses on niche subjects, Harvard should have students who have previously taken the course TF, rather than graduate students without specialized knowledge of the subject. This model currently exists for many large STEM courses, but I have yet to encounter it in any of my humanities or General Education courses. While such undergrad students would likely lack the depth and rigor of a graduate student in that field, the mere fact that they previously excelled in the course gives them an advantage over arbitrarily chosen graduate students. Reviewing the material a second time, now as a teacher rather than student, will allow them to glean new insights and develop connections between different course topics. They can also better empathize with the undergraduate student experience.

TFs should be given ample opportunities to teach courses which are relevant to their studies. There are currently minimum thresholds of enrolled students needed for a course to receive a TF in certain departments. This arrangement harms graduate students with specific or uncommon areas of study, as there often are not courses offered in their field of study that meet this minimum student threshold. In order to fulfill their teaching requirement, they resort to teaching subjects of which they are neither knowledgeable nor passionate. This reflects part of a much broader issue concerning hiring in academia, but Harvard can mitigate this specific problem by removing the student cap and allowing TFs in smaller courses.

This fix won’t solve the employment needs of many Ph.D. students, so Harvard should also consider more creative ways for Ph.D. students to fulfill their teaching responsibilities: perhaps through independent studies with students.

Lastly, sections deserve reconsideration. Professors should work with TFs to think about whether their section time improves students’ learning experience. If sections are not providing substantive help nor novel insights on the material, they should be eliminated or redesigned.

So let’s focus on who really runs the classroom. If we want to fix academics, we need to start with teaching fellows.

Miriam E. Goldberger ’28, a Crimson Editorial editor, is a Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations concentrator in Dunster House.