1. Teaching Assistant Scheduler & Question-Solver
Alan Herman | Matthew Hsieh | Montserrat Lobos | Minnar Xie | Paul Kim
Team AMMMP
Section E

2. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Context
● Office hours and not recitations or class
● Observed TAs from both code-intensive
classes and classes that were systems design
● Mixed experience levels among TAs

3. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Issues Observed
TA office hours are either
really packed or really empty
Empty: TA wastes time and does not work on tasks for office hours
Packed: TA is extremely busy and does not help all students efficiently
Conclusion

4. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Issues Observed
TA answers the same question multiple times

5. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Issues Observed
When the TA doesn’t know the answer to a
question, he spends a lot of time searching
through external resources
Wastes the time of TA, Student, and other students who are waiting

6. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Systemic Issues
Time is not efficiently used
●
●
Not enough TAs relative to students so TAs need to be efficient with time
TAs aren’t prepared for office hours

7. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Systemic Issues
● There is no structure to share TA knowledge
from semester to semester
○ No required/built-in training
○ No repository for questions and answers

8. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Proposed Solution
(Teaching Assistant Scheduler & Question-Solver)
Conclusion

9. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Proposed Solution
Aggregates student
questions before
office hours
Dynamically schedules
students with the same
problem for the same
time slot
Builds a central
repository for Q&A for
all TAs, students, and
future semesters

10. Intro
Student 1 has a question.
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion

11. Intro
Problem
Student 1 uses TASQ to submit his question to his TA
Solution
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Conclusion

12. Intro
Problem
TASQ aggregates students’ question and groups them
Solution
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Conclusion

13. Intro
Problem
Solution
TASQ allows TAs to see if students have submitted any questions
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Conclusion

14. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
TASQ has grouped
similar students’
questions together
that allows the TA to
send immediate
feedback.
If the TA cannot
provide an
immediate answer,
he will select a time
slot that works for
both students and
schedule a time slot
during his office
hour.

15. Intro
Problem
Solution
Student 1 is alerted when he gets a response from a TA to his question
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Conclusion

16. Intro
Problem
Student 1 confirms his appointment to the TA.
Solution
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Conclusion

17. Intro
Problem
Solution
The TA views his office hour appointment schedule before the office hour.
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Conclusion

18. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion

19. Intro
Problem
TASQ allows the TA to prepare for upcoming questions.
Solution
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Conclusion

20. Intro
Problem
During the office hour.
Solution
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Conclusion

21. Intro
Problem
Solution
TA looks at his schedule and notices that Group 1 is the first group in the queue.
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Conclusion

22. Intro
TA helps students in Group 1.
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion

23. Intro
Problem
TA then moves on to help the next group of students.
Solution
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Conclusion

24. Intro
TA helps students in group 2.
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion

25. Intro
Problem
Solution
Students get the help they need in efficient manner, and they are happy.
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Conclusion

26. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Design Features
Time for each office hour is adapted to
best fit the students’ needs.

27. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Design Features
Notifications will be sent to other TAs if
office hours will be very busy

28. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Design Features
TAs can save time explaining the same
thing to multiple students because the
system automatically matches time
slots for students with the same
problem

29. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Design Features
TAs can answer the questions of
students on the application, saving
time at office hours
Students can view answered questions
in a repository

30. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Benefits of TASQ
TAs can prep questions before office hours
allowing for more efficient time use

31. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Benefits of TASQ
Helps prevent TAs from having to explain
solutions for the same problem over and over

32. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Benefits of TASQ
System allows TAs to keep track of what has
been asked and answered
Conclusion

33. Intro
Problem
Solution
Benefits of TASQ
Allows TAs to predict attendance flow
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Conclusion

34. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Potential Problems
● The success of the application depends on TAs
managing the questions and answers
● TAs having to spend more time outside of office hours

35. Intro
Problem
Solution
Holes
● Walk-ins vs. appointments
● Last minute questions are inevitable.
● Planning ahead: How early?
○ Can issues can be properly described in questions?
● TAs on-call
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Conclusion

36. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
Conclusion
Improve Attendance
flow
Efficient use of
external resources
Reduce Redundancy
Reuse Knowledge

37. Intro
Problem
Solution
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Conclusion
This is an iterative design process
Conclusion