Rolando Aguilar Interview

The interview with Mr. Rolando Aguilar, a graduate student and teaching assistant for Dr. Carl Dirk’s Organic Chemistry lab, was a very interesting and different one from all of my other interviews, mainly because he is the first person I’ve interviewed who is closer to my age and with whom I can communicate and relate better than other interviews. I was also interested in interviewing him because of his position as a TA, especially in a lab; this interest stems from my own interest to become a TA in the near future. His interview involved the standard question of why he was interested in chemistry, which is a question I wish to ask as many people as possible. More importantly, I asked him what kind of obstacles do you face as a TA, as well as how to become one.

When/Why did you become interested in studying Chemistry?

He began by describing his uncertainty on what to study as he approached college, however it was actually by his last year of preparatoria (high school) that he began to develop a strong interest in Chemistry, he mentioned it was thanks to one of his professors that he became interested in the field of Chemistry, and from that point on that is what he began to study. He mentioned how his interest also grew when he got a chance to work in an actual lab setting as an undergraduate,

He then went on to describe how it’s pretty much like applying for any job, except that they’ll look more intently at your grades than other places would. He mentioned how in his case there was a lot of competition for the position, and like most other places he had to submit a form and go through a similar process similar to an actual job. He emphasized pretty extensively how being a TA is basically having a part-time, except this job depends on your academic