Browsing by Subject "Writing center"
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Item Managing a writing center within a changing university(2010-05) Bitzel, Alanna Mae; Rhodes, Lodis; Leit, LisaThis report addresses how leaders at the Undergraduate Writing Center (UWC) at The University of Texas at Austin (UT) can respond to changes in administration, staff, and funding to promote awareness and recognition of the UWC and increase funding to both preserve and enhance UWC programs and services that will address the needs of UT’s dynamic student population. In doing so, I apply reflective and deliberative practitioner theories to writing center work, analyzing my work at the UWC from the perspective of a reflective practitioner and participatory planner. I first provide an overview of the UWC. I then explore theories related to writing pedagogy and practice and serving as a reflective and deliberative practitioner. Next, I discuss trends in the university climate in general and UT in particular, using them to contextualize the challenges affecting the UWC as an organization working with the university system as it enters into the transition period. Finally, I propose responses to these challenges as well as future directions for UWC leaders.Item Rhetorical possibilities : reimagining multiliteracy work in writing centers(2012-08) Mendelsohn, Susan Elizabeth; Mullin, Joan A., 1949-; Faigley, Lester, 1947-; Ruszkiewicz, John; Syverson, Margaret; Bomer, RandyAs multimodal composing plays more prominent roles in academic, professional, and public life, writing centers are challenged to take on multiliteracy work, and some have even gone so far as to redefined themselves as multiliteracy centers. However, writing centers that take on this work will find process theory, which has dominated writing consulting since the 1970s, inadequate for the task. A study of the history of the higher- and lower-order concern prioritizing strategy demonstrates the shortcomings of process pedagogy-based tenets of writing center practice. They represent historical vestiges of the field’s struggle for disciplinary legitimacy rather than a response to exigencies of composing. Teaching multiliteracies instead demands a rhetoric-based approach. This project explores what such an approach would mean for the writer/consultant interaction, consulting staffs, the writing center’s institutional identity, and centers' role in the public sphere. I redefine the role of writing consultant as rhetoric consultant and propose a writing/multiliteracy center-specific pedagogy of multimodal design. The focus then turns to finding definitions of centers that can shape their evolving identities and construct multiliteracy work as integral rather than an add-on. Drawing upon Kenneth Burke’s frames of acceptance, I examine the limitations of the field’s defining mythologies and propose a way forward in identity formation, shaping definitions of writing/multiliteracy centers that are at once stable and flexible. Finally, this project argues for a fresh interpretation of the center’s core identity as a democratizing force. John Dewey's definition of publics helps to define the field's democratizing mission as a project of extending access to education to diverse groups of people. Projected growth in the number and diversity of higher education enrollments offers writing/multiliteracy centers important opportunities to shepherd underrepresented groups through college. However, a more ambitious democratizing mission stands within reach: the changing landscape of composing challenges centers to support composers who want to take active roles in the public sphere. This project proposes pedagogical shifts that make public work possible.Item Tutoring technical documents in the writing center: implications for tutor training and practices(Texas Tech University, 2009-05) Hughes, Lori R.; Baake, Kenneth; Kemp, Fred; Rickly, RebeccaThis work examines tutor training and practices for working with students who bring technical documents to the writing center. The researcher considers how the process of tutoring technical documents such as resumes, proposals, and reports influences the direction of the tutorial and offer suggestions for how administrators can prepare tutors to work with these types of documents. The researcher conducted a three-part qualitative study of formative and evaluative methods. After visiting three university writing centers of comparable size and scope and conducting interviews with the centers’ administrators and tutors followed by a rhetorical analysis of the top technical communication academic program writing center Websites in the United States was conducted in order to look for trends and practices. In addition, the researcher conducted a series of three online focus groups with members of the writing center community (administrators and tutors) in order to better contextualize the best practices of tutor training methods for working with diverse populations—in particular, students who bring technical documents to the center. Information gathered from the site visits and interviews, website analysis, and online focus group discussions helped to determine the best practices for writing centers to work with students who bring technical documents to the center, and provide future directions for tutor training to better meet the needs of this population.