okay, why does it take so long for a ta to answer emails? and when you don't know something, how do you handle it?

So I've got four...
a. How do you get into grad school?
b. What are you going to it for?
c. Is it difficult to pay for?
d. And "...why they don't seem to know shit?" ?

a. Apply
so you want good enough GRE and GPA scores that you aren't culled. Look for a department that matches your interests, so I would not apply for philosophy of religion heavy schools for instance. What you really need are great letters of rec and a fantastic writing sample.

b. I go for philosophy

c. I'm funded. Funded students are those that are TAs or research assistants. It's standard for tuition up to 6 credits to be covered (for some reason we're going to get 9 here, but that's some bullshit with this ineffective union here) you also get a stipend. It's not a lot and the amount depends on the school and the program, but it gets you by if you're willing to live like a poor college student.

d. because we don't know shit. our education is a BA generally. If you've had a class on ethics do you feel capable of teaching it? no? neither do we. The schedules are somewhat determined by our areas of expertise, we can request certain classes, but a large part of it is simply scheduling. I TA'd for history of philosophy last semester, I understand the basics of history but hadn't read the material in a long time and not to the depth that the prof does. So most of the time I am reading things along with students.
A class I am TAing for now, the prof has a different way of approaching the material, so I have been studying along with the students in order to understand the material enough.

That doesn't mean we'll never know, or we aren't sure of our grades and whatever. The problem is just when you put someone on the spot with tough questions sometimes they just do not know at the moment. It happens.
I had a student asking if our book, which we had read 3 chapters of, was going to address more modern ideas of gender, and wanted to get at arguing against some of the biology of the book. I was 5 chapters in, it's a hard book, I don't know the answer to that stuff.

An added issue is that sometimes we're tossed into lecture. It's been snowing like crazy here and I had one morning where I got a message a few hours before class saying the prof wouldn't be in and cover chapter 10-12. That's only a few hours to get comfortable enough with the material to teach it. That sucks.
I've seen other TAs get 1 hour of notice. Shit happens, we carry on, but when you see the TA trying to lecture, especially if they are taking over for the day, be nice.
We're new, we're still learning, we're still getting experience, and you're seeing a bunch of people at the very start of their careers. It's like someone grabbed the intern and said "you need to pitch the meeting, here's some talking points"

You're still alive? I've heard plenty of horror stories from numerous people, and all I can say is that I feel for ya. Graduate school is its own beast, and unfortunately, nowadays, grad students are also being used as cheap labor (at least in the science fields) more so than previous generations. Best wishes to you, and I'll enjoy being an undergraduate while it lasts XD

Do you ever worry that your involvement in the furry fandom could negatively impact you professionally? (I know this isn't /quite/ about grad school, save that furrydom and studenthood seem to be highly correlated and, while some professions seem to care not what their employees do on their spare time -for example, tech industries- I'm not sure how friendly academia would be to someone who participated in furry things.)

So I'm a TA. I'm curious: From your experience, do most TAs compete to be the "best TA," or do they try to avoid raising the bar too high?