Executive Education tuition reimbursement and how to ask for it

There are countless reasons why savvy employers prioritize investing in employee training and development. Professional development attracts and retains top talent, increases staff productivity, helps staff navigate organizational change, and boosts the bottom line. But if your employer isn’t broaching the subject, you can proactively request training yourself.

Most organizations have funds set aside for tuition reimbursement. Tell your HR representative that you are interested in external employee training and education. They should be able to supply you with a tuition remission application. Once this form is complete and approved, you are able to apply for any of our courses.

Making a business case

Executive education consists short training courses and certificate programs that help professionals of all backgrounds (not only those in executive positions,) enhance their leadership, communication, and other critical business skills.

Executive education is seeing unprecedented investment, as much as $50 billion annually in the U.S. Still, asking your employer to fund a Johns Hopkins Executive Education course can be a delicate subject, especially when budgets are tight. When your boss’s focus is on the bottom line, you need to be prepared to make a clear argument for why it’s in the best interest of the company. Fortunately, there’s a wealth of data to help you make a business case for training funding that’s hard to argue with.

Here are four points you can bring up when asking for executive education and other training opportunities at work, plus an email template you can customize for your specific situation.

1. “I’ll be a more productive, more valuable employee.”

Employee training works. According to one study, The True Cost of Not Providing Employee Training, companies that prioritize employee development make median revenue per employee of $169,100 compared with $82,800 for companies that don’t. If the course you’re interested in is related to leadership development, you can also use compelling data from this Ken Blanchard study and this Deloitte University Press article, Better pond, bigger fish   to demonstrate that investing in your leadership development will benefit the company’s bottom line. Your pitch can go something like this:

“Studies show that by implementing the leadership practices covered in this executive education course, I will be able to increase my productivity by at least 5 percent, helping me complete projects more efficiently and add more value to the company. That increase in productivity is why, as other studies show, companies that invest in developing their employees’ leadership skills see 37 percent higher revenue per employee and 9 percent higher gross profit margins.”

And if your company is public and has shareholders to please, tell your boss: companies that rate highly for their investments in human capital deliver stock market returns five times higher than those with less emphasis on human capital.

2. “I’ll incorporate what I learn into our organization.”

Johns Hopkins Executive Education courses are designed to produce real-world solutions fast. Bring actual work challenges to the class so that you can bring immediate, actionable insights back to your organization. Part of that is sharing what you learn with your co-workers. When making your business case for training, offer to prepare a presentation about the course and provide specifics about how it can be integrated into your current structures, strategies, and policies. Emphasize that through this one course, your employer is really investing in entire teams and divisions, increasing the value of their investment.

3. “I’m ready for more responsibility.”

Even if there aren’t opportunities to take on more responsibility or assume leadership roles at your organization, there may be opportunities in the future. Johns Hopkins Executive Education courses can help ensure you’re ready when the opportunity arises. Let your boss know that you’ll be gaining the skills you need for a leadership role, and you’ll be ready for advancement when the time comes.

This also demonstrates to your boss that you’re preparing for a future with your organization. Replacing an employee can be extremely costly—ranging from 20 percent of annual salary for midrange positions to 213 percent of annual salary for highly educated executive positions. Making it clear that you’re committed to growing within the company should be a compelling reason for your boss to invest in your professional development. This is why 94 percent of companies plan to increase or keep the same level of investment in leadership development training year-over-year.

4. “Investing in my education is less expensive than hiring and training a new employee.”

Compare an Executive Education course to the cost of hiring and onboarding a new employee. The hiring and training process can range from 20 percent to 200 percent of an employee’s salary. When it comes to bringing the latest best practices and critical new skill sets to your organization, it’s far more cost-effective for your boss to let you acquire those skills through professional development training than it is to hire someone from the outside the company.

Johns Hopkins Executive Education courses make you a smarter, stronger professional. You get better at your job. Your organization sees better results. Both you and your employer benefit.

To help make the conversation about investing in your next professional and leadership training opportunity easier, use our email to make a clear business case to your boss. You just need to fill in the blanks. Of course, you know your employer best, so tailor the wording to how they will best receive it. It can help you secure funding as you register for executive education courses that make you a more versatile professional and advance your career.

Finding and hiring a teaching assistant

Verify your eligibility for a teaching assistant (TA) 

Review "Eligibility requirements to request TA support" on the Employing Students webpage on Inside Carey.

Finding a TA

OPTION A:  Invite one of your top students to be a TA. If they are interested, proceed to the next section to verify eligibility.

OPTION B:  Enlist the help of Carey.TA. In your email, please include the course and term and any prerequisites (e.g., the student must have taken the course, received a specific grade, and/or has relevant work experience).

OPTION C:  Post an advertisement on SMILE, a Johns Hopkins platform for student hiring and experiential learning managed by the university.

1. Select Employers on the SMILE homepage and login with your JHED ID.
2. Select which type of position you would like to post (paid campus internship or student job).
3. Specify the details of the position (description, pay rate, hours per week, work location, open to undergrads/grads/both, etc.).
4. Submit your position (positions will be reviewed and approved within 48 hours).

Initiate the hiring process

Once you have identified a TA, begin the hiring process by completing the online request form. Please allow 2 to 3 weeks for processing. As a reminder, your TA cannot begin work until you receive an email from HR confirming eligibility and providing a hiring confirmation. 

Train your TA

If you hire a first-time TA, or if your TA would benefit from a refresher, email Carey.TA to request that they be enrolled into the TA Resources site in Canvas. This site contains several resources for TA-specific tasks. You are also encouraged to invite your TA(s) to pre-term Canvas training or any offered trainings for faculty.

Training recommendations

1. Based on your needs, discuss the TA’s level of skill. Contact Carey.TA for Just-In-Time Training.
2. Define your expectations.
3. Review the elements of the course and syllabus together to determine what needs to be done and when.

See more information in the section "Working With Your TA."

Be available for questions

Set up a weekly meeting time for review.

Working with your teaching assistant

When you hire a TA, you become an employee supervisor.  The following information will help you develop your communication plan and classroom management strategy to get the most out of your TA. TAs cannot work more than 20 hours per week in total.

General information

Training your TA in Canvas

Your TA might be new to Canvas and therefore need initial training. Teaching & Learning's Canvas team will work with your TA to train them in the LMS.  Once your course is available in the SIS section (prior to the course going live for students), please reach out to Carey.TA to request arrangements for Canvas training.

In your email, please include the name of the course, the name of the TA, the TA's email address, and the TA's role and identify any other technical training they might need for your classroom (e.g., proctoring software, Pearson, iDecisionGames, Microsoft Teams).

If your TA does not need training, please follow these steps to set them up in your course:

1. Navigate to your course menu and locate People.
2. After you have selected People, you will see a +People button on the right side of the screen. 
3. Choose Add User by SIS ID.  At JHU, this is our JHED ID. 
4. Enter the JHED ID (e.g., flast1) in the Email Address (required) field.  You need only  to enter the JHED. 
5. Choose the appropriate role (e.g., TA). 
6. Select Next.
7. Choose Add Users to complete the process.

Communications

Once you have hired your TA, please make time to review with them your expectations regarding the following areas: timesheets and time tracking, feedback, meetings, tutoring, office hours, grading, accessibility, attendance, monitoring Q&A discussions or Zoom chats, and Canvas calendar.

Schedule regular communication meetings throughout the term. Here are some meeting suggestions:

Kick-off meeting

• Exchange contact information exchange and determine response times.
• Identify acceptable methods of contact (e.g., email, text, phone call, Microsoft Teams, Slack, WhatsApp).
• Give an overview of the purpose of class/learning objectives.
• Classroom ethics
  • Grading Approach: Will you use anonymous grading?
  • Academic Integrity: Will Turnitin be reviewed by your TA?  What guidelines do you want your TA to follow?
  • Tutoring Parameters: Can your TA assist with homework assignments?
• Roles in the classroom
  • Prior to the course start, TA(s) can do the following:
    • Review and QA the Canvas site
    • Review for clarity and grammar
    • Using Student View, check the links and make sure all sections are visible
      • Post announcements and set up groups
  • Answer Canvas-related questions
  • Answer content-related questions
  • Assist in the Zoom classroom
  • Learn and assist with other classroom applications
• Grade and provide feedback (Note: TAs cannot grade Assurance of Learning assignments)
• Determine timelines/deadlines (Note: Please see our Classroom Management document)
• Schedule tutoring sessions or office hours (if applicable)
• Review learning tools and technology

Touch-base meetings (weekly)

• Review any issues (e.g., Canvas, technical, student)
• Reconfirm tasks for the next week (e.g., announcement posts, publishing content for student view, monitoring participation, sharing answer keys for grading)
• Review Q&A from students
• Keep notes on changes/improvements/suggestions for the next iteration of the course

Course debrief meeting

• Review and update notes for the next iteration of the course to share with the course lead and/or Teaching & Learning
• Gather feedback from your TA on their experience
• Consider inviting TA back for the next course offering

Resources 

Here are some tools that you can use and share with your TA: 

• Faculty-TA Initial Calibration: a checklist of important topics to review
• Classroom Management Template : a spreadsheet that outlines assignment due dates, expected grading completion, and classroom tasks
• Zoom Class Session Checklist
• Canvas Course Role Permissions Guide
• Canvas FAQ 

Timesheets and approvals for your TA

As the supervisor, you will need to review and approve timesheets for your TA(s) weekly. For a more efficient review process, please ask your employees to record hours worked and task(s) completed on their timesheet. Carey uses two online timekeeping applications for recording and approval of TA working hours: TimesheetX and Harvest. TimesheetX is used for all current student employees at Johns Hopkins University. Harvest is used for TAs who are casual employees. 

General information

The workweek is defined as Monday through Sunday. TAs should submit their hours by Sunday of each work week. As their supervisor, you will review/approve timesheets no later than noon on the following Monday.

There is no sick, vacation, or holiday pay for student or casual TAs.

Pay is issued on or about the 15th and 30th of the month.

TAs cannot work more than 20 hours per week in total. As a reminder, your TA might be working for more than one supervisor.

Resources

Payroll Schedule 2025

TimesheetX (you might have to login with your JHED to access)

Harvest