ELI Information for Incoming and Current Graduate Students

Requirement for attendance at this workshop is determined by the student’s undergraduate exclusive language of instruction.  Students who are required to attend ELI 994 and pass the Oral English Test (OET) are students who:

• attended an undergraduate college or university where English is not the exclusive language of instruction

Students who attended a college or university in which English was the exclusive language of instruction are exempted (excused) from the training.

1.  LSA department staff work with ELI staff to nominate students to attend the ELI 994 course for both the summer (for first time, first term GSIs) as well as for the winter term course for students who teach for the first time in their second year or beyond.  These two courses are not interchangeable.  Students (and departments) are not able to choose between them. Summer is only for incoming, first-term, first time GSIs, while the Winter term course is for students who teach in their second year on campus or later.

2. Department staff identify whether an educational institution is an English-medium instruction-only school by consulting the website called the World Higher Education Database .  Any student whose undergraduate institution did not teach exclusively in English should be included in the communication from the department to ELI regarding enrolling in the 994 course.

3. The GSI Advisor at the English Language Institute may grant a waiver after the student has been recommended for the course. This is based on a review of their previous experience with English in the U.S. and may include:

• Successful classroom teaching experience with undergraduates at an English-medium university, substantiated by student evaluations and/or a supervising professor’s evaluation memo.
• Documentation of GSI/TA training or testing at another English-medium university.
• Educational experience at the undergraduate level, e.g., exchange programs at U.S. colleges or universities.
• Educational experience with U.S. high school students, e.g., high school/secondary school exchange programs.
• Other educational experience at English-medium schools, for example, education at U.S. or international schools.
• Work experience with U.S. undergraduate students, for example, college residential advisor.

Waiver recommendations are given on a case-by-case basis, taking into consideration experiences such as those listed below.  To request a waiver, department staff should contact the GSI Advisor at ELI. Students who receive a waiver may elect to take ELI 994 if space permits, per the GEO bargaining agreement. 

Additional Options for Waivers:
Prospective employees who are not first-term GSIs may take a test of communicative skills in the Fall term for employment in the Winter term or in the Winter term for employment in the following Fall term. If the prospective employee passes the test before training, the employee may choose whether or not they would like to participate in the training. Students who are waived may take the training on a space-permitting basis.

ELI arranges housing for the students during the Summer course and students are provided a stipend of $50/day during the time we ask the students to be here, ahead of the fall semester.  Students are expected to pay for their daily living expenses and their health insurance from this stipend.

1. There are several possible outcomes for students who take ELI 994:

i. After successful completion of ELI 994, ELI staff may recommend that a prospective GSI be waived from taking the OET.

ii. A prospective GSI will move forward to take the OET.

iii. If a prospective GSI does not successfully complete ELI 994, ELI will work with the student to develop an appropriate path for future language support and development. 

2.  Any new GSI who has successfully completed ELI 994 has completed the equivalent of the CRLT GSI Teaching Orientation and should not be required to complete the CRLT GSITO.  LSA units can require new GSIs to complete other departmental GSI training requirements.  

3.  In order to ensure that GSIs who completed ELI 994 have access to the same support resources as other LSA GSIs, departments should continue to share names of all new GSIs with CRLT, noting which have completed ELI 994.  CRLT will provide these GSIs observer access to the CRLT Graduate Student Instructor Teaching Orientation Canvas site and will include them in CRLT’s “Welcome to Teaching at Michigan” emails which are sent to new GSIs over the course of their first semester of teaching.

Prospective GSIs are scheduled by the their department to take the OET at an upcoming administration, unless the student is waived from the OET based on successful completion of the course.  The OET can be administered in-person or via Zoom. Typically department staff help to schedule a student’s test through Michigan Language Assessment (MLA).  

What happens after a student takes the OET? 

i) If they pass, they are fully eligible to be a GSI and should participate in the GSI training program expected of GSIs in their department.
ii) If they do not pass, they will be referred to ELI to identify the appropriate path for future language support and development.  This may include being required to take ELI 994 prior to any future retake of the OET.

(1) Please note: The LSA Policy for Training and Testing Prospective GSIs in LSA, states that in the event that a student does not successfully complete the OET, it is incumbent on the department that made admission and support offers to identify alternative support resources that are not GSI positions and are not instructional in nature.  This alternative funding does not need to be identical to that of a GSI position, but must be at a level to satisfy the immigration requirements of Homeland Security.