Assistantships


Graduate Assistantships Resource Center

Welcome to the Graduate Assistantship Resource Center. This site is designed to assist faculty, students and graduate program administrators with the management of Graduate Assistantships.

Overview.

Colleges and Departments at the University of South Florida provide Graduate Assistantships (GAs) to qualified students on a competitive basis. GAs may teach, conduct research, or have other responsibilities that contribute to the student's professional development. GAs are classified as Graduate Assistants (9185 job code), Graduate Teaching Assistants/Associates (9183 and 9184 job codes), Graduate Instructional Assistants (9550 job code), and/or Graduate Research Assistants/Associates (9181 and 9182 job codes). All graduate assistants employed by USF work under a contract negotiated by the Graduate Assistants United (GAU) and the USF Board of Trustees. The GAU is the labor union certified as the exclusive bargaining agent for graduate assistants at USF.

Who Awards Graduate Assistantships?

Graduate Assistantships are not awarded through the Graduate School but are typically awarded through a specific Graduate Program/Department or College. The number of GA positions that are available in a given College or Department are based on funding from the university as well as grants awarded to individual faculty. To determine if a graduate program awards GA positions as well as the specific eligibility requirements, students should contact the Graduate Program Director in the department of study. Contact information may be found through the searchable Graduate Programs link.

Graduate temporary position openings at USF are posted through Careers@USF, the Human Resources' online application system. Please visit their site, employment.usf.edu, to search and apply for available openings.

To search off-campus employment opportunities, visit the USF Career Center's website, career.usf.edu. This will allow students to search the Career Center's online job listing database, Career Connections.

Graduate Assistant Eligibility

Graduate School and University financial resources are used to support full-time, degree-seeking graduate students. Eligibility requirements are applicable to all graduate assistant classification codes regardless of classification code and/or funding source. To receive an assistantship, the graduate student must meet the following eligibility requirements:

  • Accepted into a graduate degree program and meet the qualifications as specified by the graduate program
  • Meet the academic qualifications as specified by the GA job code
  • Meet appropriate verbal test scores if English in not the primary language
  • Maintain an overall minimum grade point average (GPA) and degree program GPA of 3.00
  • Enroll full-time during the semester(s) appointed as a graduate assistant. Full-time enrollment is considered 9 graduate credit hours in the fall semester, 9 graduate credit hours in the spring semester, and 6 graduate credit hours in the summer semester. If a graduate assistant is enrolled in the last semester of his/her program of study, the number of registered semester hours may be less than the full-time requirement
  • Graduate assistants must comply with all Graduate School enrollment requirements to retain their assistantship as stated in the Polices section of the Graduate School Catalog
  • Students appointed with <0.25 total FTE are not eligible for tuition waivers

Graduate School GA Contact.

Please use the links below to find the information you need. For questions about the management of GAs, please contact Ryan Durrant.

GA Links.