Various staff members and faculty members in the Department of Sociology can help you with teaching-related issues or questions.  This section of the manual identifies your key contacts and briefly describes how they may be able to assist you.

Please Note:  Staff and faculty may not be in their offices every day of the week.  They could be working from home on some days.  Consequently, it may be best to reach the following contacts by email.  If needed, a Zoom meeting can be arranged.

Staff Contacts

Several staff members in the Department of Sociology can assist you with specific questions, issues, or problems as they arise.

Colleen Colwell 

Administrative Assistant (Undergraduate Program)

Email:  sociology@mcmaster.ca

Phone:  905-525-9140, Ext. 23613

Office:  KTH 627

Colleen can provide you with all sorts of information about the ins and outs of teaching undergraduate courses in sociology!  If something is not covered in this manual, it might be best to first check with Colleen.

Corinne Jehle 

Administrative Assistant (Graduate Program)

Email:  socgrad@mcmaster.ca

Phone:  905-525-9140, Ext. 23613

Office:  KTH 627

Corinne is your contact if you have been assigned teaching assistants (TAs).  She will provide the “Hours of Work Form” that you and your TAs will have to complete.  Corinne can answer questions about this form or questions about general policies associated with TAs.

Christine Marits

Academic Department Manager

Email:  maritsc@mcmaster.ca

Phone:  905-525-9140, Ext. 24484

Office:  KTH 625

Christine can answer a variety of general questions connected to the Department and teaching courses in the Department.  She is also your contact for getting office keys!

Gerald Bierling 

Instructional Assistant

Email:  bierling@mcmaster.ca

Phone:  905-525-9140, Ext. 26513

Office:  KTH 642

If you are teaching one of the two first-year sociology courses, Gerald is your contact for instructional assistance (especially in relation to teaching assistants and technological issues).  He can also assist other instructors with general technological questions (particularly as they pertain to use of Avenue to Learn), or he can direct you to staff elsewhere at McMaster for more specialized assistance.

Teaching Professor Contacts

Teaching professors in the Department of Sociology can also provide guidance associated with teaching-related issues.  It is best to reach them through email (since most faculty members in the Department no longer have phone extensions).

Sandra Colavecchia 

Teaching Professor

Email:  colaves@mcmaster.ca

Office:  KTH 612

Lina Samuel 

Teaching Professor

Email:  lsamuel@mcmaster.ca

Office:  KTH 632

David Young 

Teaching Professor

Email:  youngd@mcmaster.ca

Office:  KTH 629

Sandra, Lina, and David are primarily responsible for teaching undergraduate courses (rather than teaching graduate courses and doing disciplinary research).  Each of them has a lot of experience with teaching undergraduate courses, and part of their job is to engage in a number of educational or informative initiatives that go beyond teaching courses (e.g., holding workshops for undergraduate students or assisting new instructors).  Please feel free to contact any of them if you have questions or need assistance.

Executive Committee Contacts

Some members of the Executive Committee in the Department of Sociology will be particularly useful contacts in relation to problematic issues that may arise when teaching undergraduate courses.  It is best to reach them through email (since most faculty members in the Department no longer have phone extensions).

Lina Samuel

Chair (Undergraduate Program)

Email:  lsamuel@mcmaster.ca

Office:  KTH 632

Marisa Young

Chair (Graduate Program)

Email: myoung@mcmaster.ca

Office: KTH 640

Karen Robson

Acting Chair (Department)

Email:  robsok2@mcmaster.ca

Office:  KTH 627

In some cases (e.g., if a serious problem emerges in relation to one of your undergraduate courses), you may need to consult with Lina or Karen.  Your primary contact here is Lina.  Depending on the situation, Lina may then address the matter with Karen.

Obtaining and Using an Office 

Office assignments for new faculty members and sessional instructors are established in the period leading up to September (when the new academic year begins).  However, in the case of sessional instructors, it may be as late as August before office assignments are determined.  Only at that point will the Department of Sociology have a clear picture of how much physical space is available for the new academic year.  Madeline will be in touch with you about the available office space.

If office assignments have not been determined prior to the submission deadline for course outlines, please leave your office location blank on an outline and Colleen will fill it in later.

After your office assignments have been established, you can get your office keys from Madeline.  You will be given a key for your office and a key for the main office of the Department (so that, after the main office has closed for the day, you can still check your mailbox or do some photocopying).  All faculty members are given a key for the main office, as are most sessional instructors (unless they are graduate students in the Department of Sociology at McMaster).

Given physical space restrictions, it is necessary for some instructors to share an office.  These shared arrangements are always required for sessional instructors, and they may also be required for faculty members in contractually limited appointments (depending on how many CLAs we have in a given year).  Consequently, particularly in the case of sessional instructors, some co-ordination may be needed between those sharing an office to ensure that their office hours do not conflict; we want you to have some privacy when discussing things with your students!  Colleen will assist sessional instructors with this co-ordination.  Once non-conflicting office hours have been established, she will post these hours on the door of an office shared by sessional instructors.  Of course, sessional instructors are welcome to use their assigned office whenever it is not being used for office hours by one of their office mates.

Missed In-Class Tests 

The Department of Sociology has introduced procedures that make it easier for instructors to deal with missed in-class tests.

If students have successfully gone through the process of requesting accommodation for medical or personal situations (as discussed above under “Accommodating Students”), and if you wish to let the students write a make-up test, the test can be overseen by an invigilator (usually a graduate student) hired by the Department of Sociology.

For several weeks of each term, the hired invigilator will be available to supervise make-up tests.  On specific dates and at specific times (to be determined each term), the invigilator will administer make-up tests for instructors who do not wish to watch over the students themselves.

To take advantage of this service, please provide Colleen with a hard copy of the test for each student who will be writing a make-up test.  Colleen will have you complete a form for each of the students.  On this form, you will select the date/time of the test (from among the several options provided) and supply information that the hired invigilator will need to supervise the test (such as the name and student number of the student and the length of the test).  The invigilator will return the completed tests to the Department for you to pick up.