about us

What can the Writing Center do for my students?

The Writing Center (or the “Communication Skills Center”) offers students free, one-on-one writing assistance. We welcome all writers, majors, and disciplines--including both undergraduate and graduate students.   

Students can work with us one-on-one, in groups (3-5 writers), or online. Our most requested service is the one-on-one assistance we offer in the Hall of Languages, Room 103. However, we also offer assistance online (http://www7.tamuc.edu/litlang/CSC/index.htm), and we would welcome the opportunity to work with groups working on similar writing projects. If you are interested in offering your students this group tutoring option, please let me know (Shannon_Carter@tamuc.edu). I’d be delighted to make it happen.

Who will students work with when they visit the Writing Center?

The writing tutors are graduate and upper-division undergraduate students selected on the basis of their strong writing and interpersonal skills. The training process for new and experienced tutors alike is quite rigorous, including—among other things—an annual, two-day Tutor Orientation, an extensive tutor-training manual specifically designed for them and their needs, a weekly tutor-training meeting (2.5 hours), multiple opportunities for evaluation and feedback, and much discussion of required readings in writing center theory and practice.

What can the Writing Center do for students?

We work from the premise that all writers benefit from productive dialogue with attentive, informed, and caring “readers” trained to ask probing questions and offer useful feedback. That’s what we do in the Writing Center; we offer writers opportunities to bounce ideas off potential readers before committing them to paper, to “try out” a draft to see whether it seems clear and convincing, to explore and discover effective strategies for revising and editing their own texts, and to push past writer’s block when it happens. In short, we are here to help writers help themselves.

What does the Writing Center promise NOT to do for students?

We will not write the paper for the student, but we will do what we can to help her achieve her own goals with our support. We will not supply content or correct usage errors for the student, but we will show her invention and editing strategies she may try out with our guidance. We will not learn for the student, but we will help her learn from herself.  We will not ignore the guidelines of the assignment the student is attempting to complete, but we will help her find ways to accomplish her goals in ways that meet the requirements detailed on the assignment sheet.

What actually happens in a tutorial session?

A typical tutorial might consist of a brief conversation about how the paper was written and how the student feels about it. Next, the tutor will likely ask the student what she wants to focus on in the tutorial. Through our questions, we encourage students to shape the direction of the tutorial session. Sometimes (often) we ask students to read their work to us so they can hear their own words in another context; other times, a tutor will model editing and proofreading strategies that the student can try out later on her own. This means we often do not get through an entire paper in a session but expect the student to complete the work on her own using what she learned in her session.

When is it appropriate to recommend students to the Writing Center? Before or after the paper is written?

We work with students at any stage of the writing process. Some writers come in with complete drafts (“What do you think of this?” or “Does it make sense to you?”); others come with partial drafts (“Now what do I do?” or “I don’t know where to go next! I’m stuck!”); still others come in with an assignment sheet and nothing else (“Where do I start? I don’t know what to do!”).  Sometimes writers come in with a completed draft that includes instructor comments (“I know what she says I need to do with this paper, but I don’t know how to make it happen! What now?”).  In other words, students don’t have to wait until the paper is complete before they come in to discuss their work with a writing tutor.

How does the Writing Center work with students who need help with grammar and punctuation?

When students specifically request assistance with these surface-level issues, we teach them strategies for working with error in their own writing. We generally don’t use drills (worksheets and the like); instead we teach students to identify their own patterns of error and correct them on their own. We direct students to handbooks and online resources they may use in future writing sessions, and we encourage them to develop proofreading strategies that work for them.

 How can I find out if a student has been to the Writing Center?

If students know ahead of time that you would like to hear about their Writing Center visits, they can request a form from us that summarizes the visit itself and discusses revision plans resulting from the visit. We like for students to have a written record of any tutorial session so they can easily apply the lessons from the session to their own writing after they leave us. Students may have a record of the session they can offer you, or you may ask them to pick up an extra copy of the completed Writing Center Report Forms for your records. Better still may be to ask the students about their visit and have them explain what they worked on. Perhaps you can even tell your students to note the name of the consultant they met with so you can call us if you have a question.

Usually when students visit the writing center, we have them fill out what we call a “proof” sheet. We keep track of various kinds of information with these sheets, including the date and time of a writing center visit, the length of the visit, the assignment that brought the student to the center, etc. There is also a place on the form for a student to record the specific purpose of the visit, and a space for the tutor and the student to write out a revision plan of sorts.

While these proof sheets can function as a way for students to “prove” that they have visited the writing center, especially for those instructors who have required a visit, they more importantly function as a written record of the session that the student can use as they work on revising their writing. The entire tutoring session cannot be recorded, of course, but the information on the form can give the student a sort of check list that will help them remember the parts of their essay they want to work on once they have left the center.

While you as an instructor can read over the revision plan that the student and a tutor have worked out, the plan has been verbally discussed during the tutoring session and may not make much sense to you when you read it out of context.
 

What happens when students go to the Writing Center and their writing doesn’t improve?

Writers develop their habits as writers (good and bad) over a period of time. Any change in writing requires practice and commitment; the more students write and revise, the more changes you’ll likely see in their writing. We don’t correct or “edit” student papers, so errors may remain in some papers even after their writers visit the Writing Center. We don’t guarantee perfect papers. What we do guarantee is that your students will benefit as writers by deeply engaging with the writing they produce. The Writing Center offers writers multiple opportunities for regular, rigorous, and productive engagement like this.

 Is it possible to send an entire class to the Writing Center?

Certainly.  Many professors do. In order to better enable us to serve all your students, however, we do have a few requests:

(1) Please tell your students that they should make an appointment if at all possible. We welcome drop-ins, and at certain points in the semester students may be able to work with a tutor without waiting for other students to finish. Many times, however, students without appointments must wait quite a while for an available tutor. We serve appointments first, so it makes sense for them to make an appointment if they can. Information about how to make an appointment can be found below.

(2) Please tell your students to do everything they can to get into the Writing Center early. When students visit us hours before a paper is due (sometimes minutes), they may be unable to actually use the ideas and suggestions generated during the tutorial session because they may not have any time left to revise. In cases like these, the tutorial session can’t be very useful to them. For this and many other reasons, we urge them to come in as early as possible—several days before the writing assignment is due, in fact.

(3) Please tell us you will be sending your students and send over a writing assignment or other information when you do. You will find the appropriate contact information here.  

How do students arrange to see a tutor?

They can stop by the Hall of Languages, Room 103 to make an appointment for a later date, drop in to work with a tutor without an appointment, or visit our cybertutor online. 

 What are some of the ways faculty encourage students to visit the Writing Center?

Some of most effective strategies include the following:

(1) Add a few sentences about the Writing Center to your syllabi (see below), including our phone number (886-5280) and location (Hall of Languages, Room 103).  Some students do not know that you encourage writing conferences unless you tell them you do.  One way to reinforce your position is to add to each assignment sheet a sentence or two recommending that they visit the Writing Center at some point in the writing process.

(2) Integrate the Writing Center into an assignment (“Discover how clear your explanation of these concepts seems to another reader by taking your draft to the Writing Center before revising it and turning it in to me”).

(3)  Suggest Writing Center visits in the comments you write on papers in progress—not as punishment but as an additional learning space supporting them as writers (“You may find the Writing Center useful as you revise this paper to address the comments and concerns I raised above”).

(4) Please do not give students the idea that the Writing Center is only for weak writers. Please remind them that talking about a writing project with others and revising papers are an integral parts of the writing processes of the most experienced writers too.

(5) Send your assignment sheets or syllabi with writing assignments to the Writing Center for the tutor’s information. We also keep guides to writing in different disciplines and various documentation styles.

 Do you have a ready-made passage I can include with my syllabi and/or writing assignments?

I am so glad you asked! :)

 “The Writing Center (or the “Communication Skills Center”) offers writers free, one-on-one assistance. We welcome all writers, majors, and disciplines—undergraduate and graduate students alike.  In fact, we work from the premise that all writers, no matter their ability level, benefit from the feedback of knowledgeable readers. The Writing Center staff is trained to provide writers with just this service. In short, we are here to help you help yourself. In order to ensure the most effective session possible, we offer visitors the following suggestions: (1) Get started on your writing project early, and visit the Writing Center at least one day before your final draft is due. You will need time to work with the ideas and suggestions generated in your tutorial sessions. (2) Bring a written copy of your assignment, any relevant readings, and one or two specific questions or concerns you would like to discuss with us. We are located in the Hall of Languages, Room 103 (903-886-5280) and online at <http://www7.tamuc.edu/litlang/CSC/index.htm>.”

Additional Information about Writing Centers

US News and World Report includes an interesting article about the ways in which writing centers across the country benefit writers—even very good writers!

Please see http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/articles/brief/06helpers.writing_brief.php

Last Updated, August 2006

Send questions/comments to Shannon_Carter@tamuc.edu

  visitors since 8/2006