graduate assistant

graduate researcher

director

assistant director

assistant professor

Florida Atlantic University

The department that I work at FAU in is one of the most toxic environments I have ever worked in before. However, I have heard from many other people that they find their work experience within FAU to be incredibly enjoyable. Unfortunately, it depends on the department / college / team that you are working within! 

Benefits are fantastic, but pay is low. Paid time off, paid sick leave, and many paid holidays including winter break. Amazing health insurance and retirement options. In my opinion, these are the only positive things about working here for me personally.

They used to offer hybrid and flexible work arrangements, but President Hasner made that go bye-bye. Working here used to be tolerable with the ability to work from home a couple days per week, but now, there is no working from home allowed whatsoever. The revocation of this policy makes it incredibly difficult for parents, caregivers, or people with disabilities - but guess what? They do not care. As long as your butt is in the seat, that is literally all that matters. 

There are a lot of politics throughout the culture. My particular department is rife with controlling and micro-managing managers who perpetuate a toxic environment of fear and control. Many long-term, toxic employees throughout ALL levels of leadership allowed to thrive in this environment. If you do not conform and submit, you will not do well here. 

Stay away from FAU Housing Department. From my first day to my last day (a few months later) I was overworked and unsupported. Training was difficult to obtain and I had to constantly ask for the training needed to be successful at my job. 

Anyone applying to FAU should know that work/life balance is boosted about on the FAU website. The housing department’s executives do not care about this and will make it mandatory to work a month straight, 10-12 hours a day, without a day off, several times a year. If you complain about this, or ask for compensation time, they will try to manipulate you by saying “We are here for the kids”. We were even told that “There is no compensation time” for weekends worked (there are departments on campus that do give compensation time). Executives have said that “Work/life balance is an illusion... it doesn’t exist”. 

Communication with executives was difficult via email and largely went unanswered. You need to consistently follow up regarding even the simplest questions (sometimes for up to a month). Even verbal communications were made difficult. When executives were asked straight forward questions the response was regularly “I’ll have to get back to you”. If you didn’t follow up, multiple times (again up to a month) you will most likely not get an answer.

The only bright spot in this department are the hard working student employees.

It's a great place to work. My co-workers are awesome and have so much patience while teaching you. We also work as a team, there is never anyone blaming anyone. They're another wonderful family.

 As a facilitator I learned how to take a group (kids, adults, rehab groups) and help them reach their desired goals (teamwork, leadership, anti-bullying, mingling, or just fun). I achieve this by presenting them a challenge in a form of a game. I give them rules and watch them as they go through their challenge. Afterwords, I have them sit and debrief. Which is basically discuss about what have transpired during the challenge. For ex.: 
How did you accomplish the goal of the challenge? What is teamwork? How did you team worked? Did anyone think of this? Were you team this or that? Etc. 

The hardest part of the job at first will be debriefing. Though, after enough practice this will be second nature. Then the hardest thing about the job is dealing with the lovely Florida weather. 

The most enjoyable part of the job is the job itself. It is a fun job, that helps you grow as a person. You start to understand people and how they work. You also help people in fighting their fear or believing themselves. Plus, when you work with awesome people like these co-workers its hard not to like this job.

It will be ideal for salary to be competitive for they are way low for the area. Message to management to promote those who deserve to promotion for due to tenure, seniority, hard work, loyalty to the department and Institution, not due to favoritism other excuses allowing great staff, faculty member to quit due to lack of advancement.

 I believe more organization in regards to students college requirements and program review. For program assistants to be well trained prior to hied that will enable students to have concrete answers instead of providing them run-around about a program and train counselors as well because no one ever knows anything  when trying to find solutions to questions resulting in terrible customer service and not providing best service to our students paying high tuition per semester.  There should be better training for supervisors and program assistants because some lack competence and don't know much of the program or don't care much for the salary/compensation isn't as much which end up delegating their responsibilities to student workers while they watch Netflix and videos while at work. Also, it will be ideal to have free coffee and creamer, as well as good filtered water in every building; all faculty and staff will much appreciate.

I worked in many different offices within FAU (mainly offices in the student support services building). It was a very stressful environment where the pro-staff employees would constantly give an abundant amount of confusing tasks to work-study and part time employees. Some of the tasks were pretty simple and tedious, like calling a list of about 500+ students and parents regarding a program or onboarding requirements. However, many tasks were very confusing and complicated and I would receive minimal amount of help or support. When I would try and ask questions or receive help, it would always be followed up with attitude or passive aggression. Sometimes they will even blatantly say to figure it out.  

If you are a workaholic and want to help students transition into college, then I would highly recommend applying. However, for-warning that you will not be in a healthy work environment and you will not receive much help from your managers or pro-staff employees. FAU needs a better group of pro-staff members to support the students. Pro-staff members who actually care about the student body. If you are passionate in fixing a broken program from the inside out, apply for this job! If

The University does not require equal accountability in all departments where workload issues are concerned especially when transitioning into new system databases which I might add here has been problematic. In the name of student retention the University has placed too much of a burden on specific departments while allowing others to seemingly "slack off." Recent budget cuts in what is being termed, "The Great Recession", has placed an unfair burden on some departments to "carry the torch" and in some cases greater departmental and individual justification. The University was not doing enough to work out these issues and help improve/streamline cumbersome procedures, policies, and practices in order to ensure that specific departments that were viewed as having a greater impact and direct correlation to student retention were not being overworked thus creating low workplace morale. You were not even allowed to think about it much less speak about it. Specific departments and offices were given preferential treatment in respect to their workspace designs and working environments.

Nice friendly work environment with customers who enjoy relaxing here playing a little pool, board games, watching TV and/or using the computer lab for studying. What I've learned form this job is how to better my people skills, give out important and accurate information that's needed. The co-workers with whom i work with, only a hand full of them are professional about what they do and are great and fantastic to work with. Others are not so professional at times and are never willing to work as a team which is something not just some of us should but every single one of us should do. The hardest part of this job is sometimes trying to keep angry and upset customers calm after they've been repeatedly given the wrong information. In other words, trying to fix what someone else on campus has messed up is the hardest part of my job. The most enjoyable part of my job is seeing the smiles on peoples faces after i'm done helping them, the smiles and laughter I share with the students here at my job is my top reason for showing up for work everyday.

Being a volunteer at the Louise and Anne Green Memory Wellness center was a great experience for me. I was exposed to individuals from different backgrounds and culture who had mild dementia. To hear about their past experiences and how they are where they are today place this drive inside me to make a difference in anyway possible. A typical day volunteering includes greeting everyone and offering help to anyone that need to go to the bathroom or simply to have a conversation with them. My co-workers were just energetic and enthusiastic about working with these individuals. There is never a dull moment working with the individuals at the center. The hardest part of the job was probably repeating instructions but after a while you become more patient and understanding which is some skills that one need to acquire to be successful. Our supervisor was always pump up and loving ready to take on the challenges for that day. The most enjoyable aspect of this volunteer position is knowing that your making a difference in someone else's life no matter how small it may seem.

Being a Volunteer in the Anatomy Medical Lab at Florida Atlantic University Charles Schmidt Medical School is a fulfilling experience. I am able to use the knowledge that I have attain thus far to teach students from sixth grade to community college about the human body and other small animals. A typical day starts by getting the cadaver or small animal prep. Getting the necessary tools to conduct the dissections. Providing the necessary images and information in the textbook that coordinates with what we are teaching as volunteers. The dynamic of volunteers is electrifying and positive. We are all eager to learn and impart what we have learn on to others. Our supervisor is really nice and helpful in anyway possible. The hardest part of the job is probably pronouncing some medical terminology and breaking them down so that others can understand.

If you enjoy helping students learn and overcome academic hurdles during college, then this is perfect for you! You get to reach out to large groups of students and help them in review and tutoring sessions that are really able to turn a students grade around.

However, be ready for repetitive and frankly useless administration tasks that will suck the soul out of you. Seriously, the required meetings and assignment deadlines are ok for the first semester of work, maybe even the second, but it gets pretty ridiculous when you must attend a team meeting after working for 2 years.

In terms of pay, I'll just say it right now; if you are gonna do an "ok" job and put in just enough work to get by, then the pay is fair. But, if you're like me and want to do an excellent job, you have to put in hours of work outside of your contract and for which you will receive no compensation. Not to mention, the pay itself could definitely be higher, especially for part time workers.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Graduate assistant 1 salary reported	$20.00 per hour
Graduate researcher 4 salaries reported	$1,600 per month
Director 6 salaries reported	$75,833 per year
Assistant director 8 salaries reported	$54,438 per year
Assistant professor 3 salaries reported	$65,467 per year

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