Article 34 of the systemwide contract and labor law give us several important protections against overwork. If you are an N-hour TA, your maximum workload is 17N hours for a regular semester or 8N hours for an 8-week summer session. If you are a tutor or reader, you have the right to be paid for the actual amount of time you work (rather than just the number of hours you were appointed for). Work time “counts” even if it is optional, explicitly prohibited, or in excess of your appointed hours.

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Workload maximums

Workload maximums denote the maximum amount of work that can be required over some period of time. There is generally quite a bit of flexibility to these roles, so ASEs may be assigned more work in some weeks than others within limits.

Term limit

The maximum workload for an N-hour TA during the fall or spring semester is 17N hours. This is called the “17 week rule.” Also:

  • During an 8-week summer session (i.e. Summer Session C), the maximum workload for an N-hour TA is 8N hours.
  • For a 6-week summer session (i.e. Summer Session D), the maximum workload for an N-hour TA is 6N hours.
  • If you’re a summer co-instructor, you are paid for work before and after the term of the summer session; your maximum workload for the pre-work period is 80 hours, and your maximum workload for the post-work period is 40 hours.
  • If you’re a summer head TA, you are paid for work before and after the term of the summer session; your maximum workload for the pre-work period is 20 hours, and your maximum workload for the post-work period is 20 hours.
  • Hourly ASEs do not have a term workload limit.

In the past, some TAs have been told that they have to work more during the semester to “make-up” for the time at the beginning and end of the semester when they are not working. This notion is incorrect; the university has agreed to pay TAs a certain amount of money for the 17 weeks of instruction, and it simply spreads that salary over five months to provide stability to pay.

Weekly and daily limits

ASEs with appointments of 20 hours or less cannot work more than 40 hours in any one week or 8 hours in any one day. The number of hours worked in excess of 20 hours per week may not total more than 77 hours per semester. There is no such protection for ASEs with appointments greater than 20 hours per week.

Holidays and weekends

ASEs cannot be required to work on university holidays. Check the academic calendar for a list of official holidays.

What counts as work?

Work time is the actual amount of time you spend working, whether required or not, including prep time, meetings, waiting time in office hours, pre- and post-semester work, hiring work, and required trainings and orientations, including the 30 minute union orientation, the teaching conference for first-time GSIs, the GSI ethics course, and mandatory UC learning center courses, such as Cyber Security Awareness Fundamentals and Abusive Conduct in the Workplace

All hours worked must be compensated. This is even the case if the work takes longer than expected, or if work is not explicitly required as part of job duties, or if ASEs are told not to overwork. For example, if you hold extra office hours to help students, this is work, even if you were told at the beginning of the semester to not overwork.

If management does not wish to pay for extra work, it is the responsibility of management to ensure that the work is not performed. Management cannot accept the benefits of overwork without paying for it. If the management makes a rule against overwork, it must enforce that rule to prevent the overwork from occurring. In any case, once the work happens, it counts as work, and ASEs must be paid for it. It is not reasonable to punish ASEs for overwork by not paying them wages for work that has occurred.

Additionally, tutors must be paid for the entirety of any pre-scheduled tutoring slot even if no students show up or if they are canceled. 375 pedagogy courses and non-mandatory social activities do not count as work time.

Log your hours

Tutors and readers are required to log their hours in CalTime. However, even though TAs are paid a salary, the university recommends that TAs log their hours as well. Why? Well, it’s the easiest way to detect workload issues and ensure that TAs are being fairly compensated for their work. Logging your hours gives you a sense of how much you’re actually doing (it might surprise you!). Also, logging your hours is a ritual that has the effect of “setting aside” your work time, giving you a healthier work-life balance.

TAs can find a helpful workload grid here. For a paper version, see here.

In the past, many N-hour ASEs were told to log only N hours per week with a false assurance that it would balance out. This is called timecard fraud, and it is illegal. You should log the actual number of hours you work each week on your timecard—including overwork, even if it was not authorized by your instructor. 

Remedying overwork

It is ideal if overwork can be avoided because it is straining on workers. However, when overwork goes unreported and unpaid, it also becomes wage theft, which is a crime (CA Labor Code, Section 204 & 215). In some cases, instructors can be individually prosecuted in wage theft claims. The lesson: try not to overwork, but if you do, please record it and talk to your instructor. 

If you exceeding any of the workload maximums. The university is supposed to offer the following remedies for overwork.

  • If you are an hourly worker consistently working more hours than your appointment, you can ask your supervisor to reduce your duties to be consistent with the number of hours you actually work. If you are OK with consistently working more hours than your appointment demands, this is OK as long as your instructor is OK with it and you log all of your hours. You cannot waive your right to be paid for all hours you work.
  • If you are a TA and you have or expect to exceed the workload maximum for the semester, you should talk to your supervisor about either reducing your job duties so that you will do work commensurate with your appointment or increasing the hours of your appointment so that you are paid for all hours worked. 

If you are unable to resolve your overwork situation informally with your instructor—or if you would like to help addressing any issue in your workspace—please contact us.

Why reporting overwork is important

There are a number of personal, social, and professional barriers to reporting overwork. Reporting overwork can be challenging, but it is always better than the alternative.

  • Overwork does not originate from a personal fault. It does not indicate that you are not doing your job efficiently enough or that you are falling behind your co-workers. Most often, overwork originates in instructors and head TAs underestimating the amount of time assigned duties will take. For example, most first time ASEs are allotted one or two hours of prep time per week, but for many it takes much longer to prep. 
  • You are not alone if you overwork. A survey of ASEs in spring 2023 found that a majority of ASEs are overworked, with that number being significantly higher for first-time ASEs. 
  • Your instructors do not want you to overwork. They care about you and do not wish to create a scenario in which you are not being fairly compensated for your work. 
  • OK, but instructors must secretly favor the people who overwork, right? Well, it’s not so simple. Instructors care a lot less about a person putting in extra work to help out in office hours than you might think. And when you overwork—or when you don’t report overwork—you put your instructor in a tricky moral and legal situation. Being open and honest with your instructor is the best way to create a healthy working relationship. 
  • The university recently agreed that it is good if ASEs are told that, “Working beyond the hours for which you are appointed or regularly taking on job duties outside of your job title is not encouraged or expected, and does not confer any advantage in hiring, re-hiring, or promotion”
  • It is unlawful for the university to retaliate against you for reporting overwork. As a practical matter, it is also rare for the university to retaliate against people for overworking. We do not know of a single instance of retaliation for overwork.