...FROM THE EDITOR...

On page 15 of this month’s newslet-ter you’ll see a momentous first: the announcement of the first European Writing Center Association confer-ence. This is yet another affirmation of the presence of writing centers as in-tegral to educational institutions around the globe. Though begun pri-marily present in American and Cana-dian schools, writing centers are now available to students in Asian, Middle Eastern, and European institutions as well.

As the addition of the European group indicates new geographical hori-zons for writing centers, the authors of this month’s articles also remind us that we are still working on solutions to problems that continue to need our attention. Beth Hewett describes a pro-gram to bring closer integration with learning disabilities specialists on her campus, Cherie Murray offers a vivid account of how she recognized more fully the needs of students whose first language is not English, and Sara Sobota shares with us her use of a homegrown video to combat student misperceptions about what a writing center is.

And as always, we welcome your contributions to the newsletter as well.

• Muriel Harris, editor

...INSIDE...

Helping Students with Learning Disabilities: Collaboration Between Writing Centers and Special Services

• Beth L. Hewett 1

Book Review:

Working With Student Writers: Essays on Tutoring and Teaching, Eds. Leonard A. Podis and

JoAnne M. Podis

• Lori Baker, Sarah Dangelantonio, D’Ann George, and Neal Lerner 6

Tutors’ Column: “Lessons from Writing Words in ‘Guatemalan’”

• Cherie L. Murray 9

Quotable Tutor Quote

• Caryn Lazzuri 10

Disentangling the Writing Center Grapevine: Creating a Video to Confront Student Misconceptions

• Sara J. Sobota 11

Conference Calendar 16

The Community College of Balti-more County at Essex (CCBC Essex) serves about 300 students with docu-mented disabilities, of which 170 are learning disabilities. However, we can-not begin to estimate the number of students with similar learning disabili-ties who either have not disclosed their

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Laying the Foundation for Collaboration

Our initial concern was to increase communication between our offices while preserving counselor-student confidentiality. Already, the Office of Special Services specified a procedure for notifying teachers about a student’s disability. This procedure ensured con-fidentiality by requiring permission from disabled students before sending generalized letters to teachers about in-dividual students’ special classroom and study needs. Upon notification, teachers legally could talk with coun-selors and the students about these spe-cific needs. Our joint program initia-tive developed a similar protocol. We wrote a disclosure statement and in-cluded it on the Student Data Form that is filled out once a semester and kept in the student’s Writing Center file. The statement encourages students with learning and/or other disabilities to disclose their special needs. Al-though the law forbids consultants to ask students directly about undisclosed disabilities, they can point to this writ-ten statement when new students read the Student Data Form. This docu-ment, somewhat public in that any Writing Center assistant or consultant can view it, does not record the student’s response. In private consulta-tion with the Writing Center secretary or Director, students fill out a Release of Information form giving the Office of Special Services permission to share appropriate information with Writing Center consultants for the current aca-demic year. Students may, of course, withdraw permission at any time.

The Writing Center sends a copy to the Office of Special Services; then, the student’s counselor sends to the Writing Center a detailed letter that specifies writing and reading issues that affect that student’s learning pro-cesses. The Writing Center keeps this letter in a color-coded file; a similar color-coded circle on the student’s file indicates that a letter is available for consultants to read and that they may talk directly with the student about his/ her disabilities.

The system for increased communi-cation and confidentiality works from the Office of Special Services to the Writing Center, as well. Special Ser-vices counselors, who have the first contact with self-identified students with disabilities, are especially impor-tant to the process. At their meeting, they give students a copy of the Writ-ing Center brochure, explain how the Writing Center might help them, en-courage self-disclosure, and offer the Release of Information. Thus, working together, we have increased our ability to give particular and informed help to students with learning disabilities.

This dialogue between the Office of Special Services and Writing Center is instructive for both parties, of course. Once back in their offices, armed with a better understanding of the Writing Center’s mission, procedures, and stu-dent/consultant challenges, the Special Services counselors can assist students who regularly meet with them to dis-cuss their classes.

Furnishing the Structure with Shared Access to Essential Technology

The third part of our joint program involves sharing knowledge about, and access to, instructional and adaptive software. Many of the latest developments in both the writing and the special services fields are technology-based. This phase of building links between the Writing Center and Office of Special Services involves training and accessing useful technology.

The Writing Program at CCBC Essex uses several kinds of software to support student learning, including the CD-ROM version of our current col-lege handbook. Together, Special Ser-vices counselors and I examine the handbook for its useful features and, with a copy on their computers, coun-selors can reinforce the value of this common writer’s tool when students visit to discuss their college course work.

Other software that we use currently is the Daedalus Integrated Writing En-vironment (DIWE), developed for computer-mediated communication (CMC). The software, like Connect, CommonSpace, and Aspects, internally networks a computer classroom and al-lows students to share files and to con-duct on-line discussions about both their writing and abstract ideas. Cur-rently, we teach about one quarter of our first-year English composition classes and developmental courses in the networked classroom. By cross-training on this software, we help the Special Services counselors to steer students to appropriate classes by high-lighting some of the skills students will learn in a CMC writing course.

Additionally, this training takes our discussion of learning disabilities and writing classes into other practical con-cerns. For example, my own research into the characteristics and effects of oral and CMC peer talk reveals that success for learning-disabled students may differ in the oral and CMC envi-ronments, depending on their indi-vidual learning challenges (Hewett, 1998). In two peer group case studies, I found that a student with a documented auditory functioning disorder and an inability to generalize from abstrac-tions had visible and quantifiable prob-lems both contributing and attending to her oral peer response group discus-sions. She believed her peer group work was relatively worthless in terms of improving her writing, and a textual examination of her writing against her group’s chats supported her belief (95-6, 174-6). In a similarly configured CMC peer group, a student with a documented profound reading disabil-ity struggled in the networked class-room because he had to write and present his papers on-line, read his peer’s papers and comments, and re-spond (talk) online. He derived his most helpful feedback from the teacher and private tutors (117-9, 188-9). Nei-ther student was well-served in the classroom environment that s/he had chosen (232-3). Such real examples have helped our Special Services coun-selors to understand that their knowl-edge of students’ particular disabilities can be instrumental in helping them decide which classroom environment might yield more success.

textHelp! includes such aids as screen reading, verbal spell checking for dys-lexic errors, word prediction, homo-phone distinction, abbreviation expan-sion, a speaking thesaurus, and a custom dictionary. Many students with spelling disabilities especially benefit from word prediction software such as Co-Writer, Handi-WORD, and Key REP, all of which anticipate word completion based on what students have begun to type, thus reducing the number of keystrokes needed, aiding spelling accuracy, and decreasing fa-tigue. Finally, there is voice-activated software, such as Dragon Dictate, which is good for students who have better verbalization skills than written expression and which assists physi-cally disabled students in completing written work.

We have placed copies of Inspiration and textHelp! on two of our Writing Center computers, providing chal-lenged students one more place where they can access this helpful software. Indeed, with trained Writing Center consultants, such students have the added advantage of receiving profes-sional writing assistance while they ac-cess useful adaptive software.

Future Challenges

The collaborative training I have just described continues with an on-going attempt to resolve problems. We have no certain answers–just challenges that we (and schools in similar situations) must overcome for the entire initiative to succeed in the long term. The first of these concerns is the time factor. Not only do we need to find the time to have the training where as many coun-selors and consultants as possible can participate, but we have discovered that one training session per year sim-ply is inadequate, especially given a Writing Center consultant-base that shifts each semester. The issue is fur-ther complicated by the mixed consult-ant-base of full- and part-time faculty; many adjunct faculty find themselves driving from college to college and, as a result, have little time to attend nec-essary, let alone supplementary, train-ing. Funding these training sessions also is a consideration. As at many schools, the money for necessary staff development is not available, even when paying staff for their valuable time may well increase attendance and, thus, raise the level of service to stu-dents. A third issue for us also may af-fect others. We are in the process of developing an On-line Writing Lab (OWL) to supplement our traditional Writing Center. While we have devel-oped basic procedures for addressing confidentiality for students with learn-ing disabilities in our face-to-face tuto-rials, an OWL lends anonymity to the tutorial scenario. Such anonymity cer-tainly has its benefits for shy students or for those who believe that using a Writing Center is stigmatizing in and of itself; however, we will need to de-velop some confidential and legal mechanism for voluntary self-disclo-sure that will enable our offices to col-laborate for these students’ benefits. Finally, although we do not use peer consultants and do not foresee doing so in the near future, we recognize that other schools make excellent use of the peer-tutoring model. Such schools with interest in instituting a system like ours will need to consider both confidential-ity issues and the problem of whether and how to prepare their students con-sultants to help self-identified students with learning disabilities.

Because ours is a new program ini-tiative, we do not yet know how many students it will benefit in the next few academic years. But, the positive learn-ing environment facilitated by the in-creased interaction between the Writ-ing Center and the Office of Special Services has led us to believe that we need to expand the program beyond the Writing Center alone and into the Writing Program as a whole, thus touching the heart of the English De-partment itself.

Works Cited ware and Myron C. Tuman. NY: 01701-5342; 508-879-9000; http://

Hewett, Beth L. The Characteristics ^{Norton, 1999.} www.microsys.com and Effects of Oral and Computer-^{Co-Writer. Macintosh format. Don} Inspiration. Inspiration Software, Inc. Mediated Peer Group Talk on the ^{Johnston, Inc.; 800-999-4660;} 800-877-4292; http://www. Argumentative Writing Process. ^{http://www.donjohnston.com} inspiration.com Diss. The Catholic University of ^{Daedalus Instructional System.} Key REP. PC format. Prentke Romich America, 1998. Ann Arbor: UMI, ^{Software. The Daedalus Group,} Co.; Wooster, OH 44691; 800

_{1998. 9906570.} Inc. Austin, TX. 1999. _{262-1984; http://www.}Dragon Dictate. Dragon Systems, Inc. _prentrom.com

Resources 320 Nevada Street; Newton, MA textHelp! Lorien Systems. Available Aspects. Software. Group Logic, Inc. ^{12160; 800-TALK-TYP; http://} from Envision Technology; Arlington, VA, 1998. ^{www.dragonsys.com} Bethesda, MD 28814; CommonSpace. Software. Sixth Floor ^{Handi-WORD. PC format.} 301-654-3568; http:// _{Media. Boston: Houghton, 1995.} Microsystems Software, Inc.; 600 _{www.texthelp.com}

Connect. Software. Ann Arbor Soft-^{Worcester Rd.; Framingham, MA}

Writing Center Director Mount Union College

Responsibilities: Specialist in Rhetoric and Composi-tion to teach writing courses at all levels in the Depart-ment of English and to direct the writing center.

Qualifications: Ph.D. is strongly preferred, required for tenure. Experience and commitment to the teaching of writing required. Must also have experience and/or re-search in writing centers. Candidates must have a com-mitment to teaching in a liberal arts setting.

Compensation: Competitive, based upon qualifications. Fringe benefits include a 10% contribution by the Col-lege to TIAA/CREF after one year service; contribution by the College toward hospitalization, major medical, disability, and group life insurance; tuition discount for spouse or children attending Mount Union.

Academic Rank: Tenure-Track Position. Starting rank will depend on academic qualifications and experience.

Send a letter of interest and resume, including the names and phone numbers of three current references to: Dr. Andrew Price, Department of English, Mount Union College, Alliance, OH 44601. E-mail: priceaj@muc .edu. Consideration of applicants will begin November 1 and continue until the position is filled. Interviews at MLA. Mount Union College is an equal opportunity employer.

Writing Center Director Western Illinois University

Western Illinois University invites applications for a tenure-track position as Writing Center Director, begin-ning August 20, 2001 (pending budgetary funding). PhD in Composition, Rhetoric, or related field; successful teaching experience; and evidence of scholarly accom-plishment or strong potential.

Demonstrated professional commitment to writing center administration, and expertise in at least one of the following: computers and writing, professional/technical writing, basic writing. Primary responsibilities: teach courses in Professional Writing Minor, graduate pro-gram in Writing, and composition; direct the writing center on campus and at regional center. Courses in General Education are part of the standard teaching load. Ten-month contract to include summer teaching and Writing Center supervision.

For more information about the WIU English Dept.: <http://www.wiu.edu/users/mieng/>

TO APPLY: Send letter, c.v., transcripts, and three current letters of recommendation to Syndy Conger, Chair of English and Journalism, Western Illinois Uni-versity, Macomb, IL 61455. Screening will begin in November and will continue until the position is filled. Interviews at MLA. WIU is an AA/EO employer.

Given Your Position on Campus, How Might This Book Prove Handy?

Sarah: As a person who wears many hats (FYC coordinator, writing center director, English faculty, Freshman Seminar coordinator, Gen Ed coordina-tor), the book appeals to me most be-cause of the various audiences who might find a piece of the text useful . . . For instance, where there is discussion about college discourse communities, I noted that this would be useful to pass along to the instructors of our Fresh-man Seminar course as these issues are pertinent to working with incoming students.

While the advice in section I is pegged at writing tutors, I also found the segments useful for my faculty who teach FYC and who engage in sig-nificant amount of conferencing with students. As a person who is fre-quently called upon to “suggest a good reading on X,” I was pleased with the inclusion of the bibliographies for ad-ditional readings.

Neal: My position is varied in simi-lar ways to what Sarah describes. I don’t teach a peer-tutoring course, though my writing center staff and I do meet periodically, and often at those meetings we discuss readings. That’s probably the place where I’d be most likely to use this book. It’s interesting that the chapters that have stayed with me since my initial reading are those about students’ experiences with mak-ing sense of the discourse demands of specific teachers and of higher ed gen-erally. It’s not the chapters about tutor-ing per se, but that might say more about my interests and needs than the book itself.

D’Ann: I direct our writing center, teach a tutor-training course, and will eventually teach a course called “Writ-ing and the Teaching of Writing,” de-signed to improve students’ writing and prepare them to teach at the sec-ondary school level. Because I want to encourage students to position them-selves in a personal, autobiographical way within their academy study, tutor-ing, and future teaching, I’ll end up us-ing the many chapters in this book where authors openly discuss their per-spectives as queer, and/or white and middle class, and/or male, etc.

I also think the book provides a valu-able critique of the notion that there is only one standard for good academic writing: faced with constant pressure from legislators to guarantee students’ performance on standardized tests, fu-ture teachers need to hear a counterargument for a greater variety of form and self-expression in student writing.

Lori: I direct our Writing Center and teach a practicum course that is re-quired for English Education students. Often other students take the course as an elective. All students in the course are required to tutor in the Writing Center for part of their practicum credit.

While I’m at it, let me also complain about the organization of the sec-tions—could you all figure out the rhyme and reason for why some chap-ters were in some sections?

Okay, my last gripe: I felt that the contributions had a certain “doctri-naire” feeling, particularly with their use of specific terms such as “essentialize” and “New Paradigm.” Perhaps it’s an inevitable part of the growth process for these students; I can remember doing the same thing af-ter being exposed to liberatory theory. But I would have liked some acknowledgement on the editors’ parts that what we were reading in this book came from a particular critical point of view, one that might have had more to do with their tutor-training class than with their emerging “voices.”

Okay, enough with the (somewhat) cheap shots.

D’Ann: Like Neal, I wish that the in-troductions to sections had done more. Perhaps instead of merely summariz-ing what’s to come, they could have suggested how different readers might use each section. For example, how might the section on classroom peda-gogy prove useful to a tutor in a writ-ing center?

The peer tutors who work in Bridgewater’s center, who each read a section of the book, felt that the book did a better job describing how to posi-tion oneself within a text than in a tuto-rial situation. For example, the piece on Black English contains a wonderful dialogue between three African Ameri-can students about who speaks Black English and why, but it fails to explain what a tutor should do when she con-fronts Black English, or other nonmainstream dialects, in a client’s paper.

Even more confusing to my students, the student editor of the conversation erases any trace of dialect from her transcript, implying that tutors should help clients to erase Black English from their writing since, as she claims, “what was being said was a bit more important than how it was said.” So much for the elsewhere-emphasized connection between identity and voice!

Lori: I had a difficult time reading the text, in part because I felt like I was reading the student papers from my practicum class, and it’s just not time for those yet in the semester! But I don’t think I’m the audience for this book. It wasn’t written to me as some-one who has already studied this field and wants new information; it seemed to be written more for the newcomer, someone who’s either a new peer tutor or new to teaching comp or new to di-recting a writing center.

The last part of the book was more interesting to me, perhaps in part be-cause the reprints there were a little newer and also because I found the first-person accounts by students who had been labeled “other” most interest-ing.

I too found, like Neal, that there seemed to be too many reprints—some stuff quite dated—and that those led the rest of the chapters. But someone fill me in here: Are the Podises well-known in writing center work? Were these reprinted articles pretty important in their day? I don’t want to be dis-missive or insulting—I’m just trying to figure out my own positioning in rela-tion to the text and the authors.

One of those “positioning” issues has to do, I think, with my coming through grad school specifically in Rhet/Comp. I can tell that the assumptions underly-ing theory here seem to originate more in literary theory. (Maybe that ac-counts in part for the D’Ann’s peer tu-tors’ excellent insight about how the book helps position oneself to a text and not so much a tutorial situation.)

Lori: I agree with you: while I don’t think that I would make students buy the book for a class, I’d like to show it to them, and they might want to refer-ence it in their own research. I might use a couple of chapters for readings, but not the whole thing.

What was Your Favorite Chapter and How Might You Use It?

D’Ann: Since many of us com-mented positively on the book’s en-gagement with issues of voice, iden-tity, and the personal, I thought I might squeeze a few more comments out of you guys. I’ll begin.

Emily Fawcett, a peer tutor, does a great job explaining why the language of college professors often seems so detached and dehumanized: in short, they (or should I say we?) fear loss of authority in the classroom. I only wish Fawcett had explored writing centers as important sites for helping students (both tutors and tutees) to critically ex-amine—and perhaps compose alterna-tives to—a traditional academic voice. Still, I imagine using this chapter to open a discussion with tutors about their own experiences writing for col-lege professors.

Lori: I think Jennifer Wewer’s chap-ter on working with dyslexic tutees would be useful. Wewer, a peer tutor, seems to be writing to other peer tutors who need some background informa-tion on dyslexia. Most helpful in this chapter are the quotations and summa-ries Wewer shares from her interviews with five dyslexic students; hearing what the students say they need and prefer from peer tutoring is valuable. While some of her phrasing seems a little imprecise (for example, she refers to the “New Paradigm,” which might be confusing to someone reading only her chapter), her essay provides a per-spective that, coupled with other read-ings on working with learning-disabled students, could spark some good dis-cussion in a practicum class or tutor staff meeting.

I also found Virginia Pryor’s chapter, “Writing in Academia: The Politics of ‘Style,’” thought-provoking. Pryor writes in three different styles: the extremes be-tween a stridently academic voice and what she refers to as a “Southern rural” style, and a style she considers to be in between the two. While this essay is not directed particularly to writing-center work, Pryor’s purposeful manipulation of the style would help peer tutors to con-sider how the students may be struggling to reconcile or work with different voices. I found the piece to be creative in its structure, and while the deliberate ma-nipulation of style and terminology may turn some readers off, the content could provide the basis for a discussion about how writers, and the students we tutor in particular, learn to navigate (and critique) academic discourse.

Neal: As I said previously, the chapters that deal with students’ struggles to write in college were my favorite, but the one that represents that struggle best, I think, was Elizabeth Schambelan’s “Defining a Persona Within the Boundaries of Aca-demic Discourse, or God, I Sound Like a Pretentious Ass.” The title alone makes it a favorite for me, but Schambelan also manages to critique dominant academic writing conventions without a heavy-handed attack but instead by relating her personal struggle and reflecting on that struggle. For example, she writes “aca-demic writing is problematic to me be-cause it asks me to construct a persona that I dislike.” It’s the struggle between the personal “I” and the detached and ab-stract, between Schambelan’s vision of herself as “a future grad school student” and as an artist. Sad, of course, that she and others in this book see such polar-ized, either/or choices. And if so-called “academic writing” is so lousy, why have her teachers placed such value on it? But I take heart in Schambelan’s acknowledg-ment of her need to find “balance” or of “integrating personas” rather than choos-ing one end of the continuum. That’s a powerful message for all student writers and teachers.

Lessons from writing words in “Guatemalan”

“Can I really do that?” she asked. “Why not?” I responded. And then I watched her relax and begin to write word after word after word. It was an amazing experience for both of us. That afternoon, for the first time in the term, Maria completed a short paper and turned it in to her literature profes-sor. From this experience came my un-derstanding that tutors need to be open and flexible because each new student brings their own ways of knowing, of learning, of expressing themselves; and, our goal, after all, is to help stu-dents learn to express themselves, their knowledge and experiences, through successful writing.

First attempts at articulation of an idea or subject often demonstrates “a [basic] writer’s “inner, preverbalized thought, not yet shaped for communi-cation” (232) according to Mina P. Shaughnessy, whose work, Errors & Expectations, became my tutoring bible some years ago. In that moment with Maria, I had discovered a new perspective in, and technique for tutor-ing writing. I knew that this is what the “discovery” process is all about—get-ting everything out of our head on to paper, using whatever tools we have at that moment. As writers, we each dis-cover in our own “language,” no mat-ter what language that may be. We write it in shorthand; in hastily sketched ideas, key words, and phrases; in idioms and vernacular; and, we list, cluster, brainstorm, web, cube, network, bubble, and dialogue until our notes are sufficient to recover what we know, what we feel, what we think. Maria wrote what she was thinking in Spanish, and we translated her words, her ideas, and her feelings until she was satisfied with the results. But, this discovery went beyond the common, ESL-type, sentence-level errors which usually get between the brain and the paper. Maria was now free to use her best tool—her first language—where her personal authority also exists (along with her “preverbalized,” un-shaped thoughts), but which had sadly been dormant in the traditional Ameri-can university classroom.

While ideally there already existed a personal “authority” which should have told Maria it was all right to use her own “voice” in an American col-lege class, the sometimes overt (or more often implied) intimidation of college classrooms tended to negate that voice for whatever reasons. In the Writing Center, a tutor gave Maria “permission” to write her ideas in the language with which she was the most comfortable, helping her to overcome the classroom fear of responding to a prompt. Early in the process of learn-ing to use an academic language, the tutorial triangle of instructor, student, and tutor needs to work together to en-courage all basic writing students to take personal authority for their own written product, but the dilemma comes in the question, “How do basic writers bridge the gap to academic lan-guage before they understand it and have learned how to use it—how to build it?”

Over the years, I have used this “write-it-in-your-own-language” tool with students of several languages, in-cluding two Japanese students who brought their pocket electronic transla-tors to our sessions. But, I have used the technique more often with students who speak Americanized English full of its idioms, jargon, and slang. When the students’ papers sound verbose or like inflated prose, I now ask them to look up from their essay and tell me in their own words what it is they are try-ing to say. It works every time. Then, I tell them to return to their paper and write it like they just said it; the prob-lem that gets in the way of sincere, re-sponsive prose generally goes away. Although it’s just a starting point, it’s such a simple solution—Maria wrote what she was thinking using her own “Guatemalan” words, and we trans-lated and negotiated her words, her feelings, her ideas, until she was satis-fied with the result. This young, very bright ESL student had been freed to use her best tool—the language that she brought from home. A language which gave her a sense of place, where her personal power exists, the place where critical thinking exists, waiting to be expressed. Language, specifically our personal lexicon, is where the per-sonal voice of all students is found, no matter what their first language; but, more often than not, that voice remains dormant while it waits for someone to acknowledge it and give it power.

Something still gets in the way, though. Even while I re-read, re-thought, and revised this text, a profes-sor edited for me and gave me new in-sight into what might be the basic problem: “It’s not ESL,” he pointed out, “it’s EFL—not English as a Sec-ond Language; but, English as a For-eign Language. Think about it.” And he left it at that.

Shaughnessy, Mina P. Errors & Ex-pectations. New York: Oxford UP. 1977.

Quotable Tutor Quote

Disentangling the writing center grapevine: Creating a video to confront student misconceptions

“If you could get one idea across to every student who enters the room, what would it be?” I asked the consultants.

“Don’t be so afraid,” said Anita, a junior whose cheerful demeanor is as consistent as her Southern drawl. “Stu-dents come in here and they’re so ner-vous that sometimes they can’t concen-trate on their papers. So I spend the first ten minutes just talking to them, asking about themselves and avoiding the topic of writing altogether,” she ex-plained. “Gradually, when they feel more comfortable, we get around to discussing their paper. Then, by the time they leave, they’ll say, ‘This wasn’t so bad.’ It makes me wonder, who do they think we are? Some kind of monsters? Do they think we’ll laugh at them or yell at them or something?”

Jeanette added, “I wish somebody would tell these students that we DON’T PROOFREAD FOR THEM! I sometimes get tired of students coming in here and acting like we OWE them something, like we’re doing them a fa-vor by helping them,” she confessed. Sometimes they just sit there while we try to make suggestions, and they don’t even listen, and yet when they leave they expect to get an A on their paper! And it’s just because they graced our doorway!”

As the conversation progressed, we talked about the kinds of student be-liefs and behaviors we commonly en-counter and what truths we would have the students understand when they en-ter the center; between complaining, giggling, and recognizing shared expe-riences, we created a list of the most common situations that occur as a re-sult of that vast yet elusive verbal net-work that seems to reach our students long before we do. What began for the consultants as a brainstorming session for common myths about the Writing Center turned into an audience-based informational video. We drafted scripts, selected roles, and memorized lines. As the project evolved and we began incorporating the video into our classroom orientation sessions, I real-ized that the scope of the project was multi-faceted; not only did it help us directly address the misinformation that seems to proliferate on campus, but it served as a valuable training ex-perience for the consultants, a helpful reminder for faculty members, and a boost for our campus-wide profile.

I allotted an entire semester for creat-ing the video. Rather than focusing on the finished product and working in-tensely to complete it in a few weeks, I wanted the concept and the project to evolve gradually. The video became a regular topic of discussion among con-sultants during the first two months of the spring 1997 semester. We wrote the script over a period of two weeks and held a staff meeting in March to conduct a group revision. Coastal’s television studio staff lent their assis-tance and equipment for the filming of the video in early April, which was completed in a few hours, and they also provided the editing, graphics, music, and credits. I suggested a few minor revisions to the product after viewing it a few weeks later, and the video was ready for presentation by the end of the semester.

As the script for the video went through numerous revisions, the over-all structure of the piece took shape. We determined that the first half of the video would consist of a series of skits portraying unproductive sessions in the Writing Center, while the second half would depict a productive session. Thus, students would be left with an accurate example of a typical consulta-tion. I would serve as video narrator, intermittently commenting on the scenes and pointing out how and why misconceptions originate. We filmed the video in the Writing Center so stu-dents would both be familiar with the setting when they visited for the first time and so they would take note of its inviting and open atmosphere.

The actual shooting of the film provided another valuable training experience for all. Some consultants had memorized their lines and rehearsed their scenes repeatedly, while others had merely familiarized themselves with the general concepts to be com-municated in their scenes and impro-vised their lines as the scenes pro-gressed. In each scene, the actors were obligated to revisit the purpose of the video as they literally placed them-selves in the position of a first-time cli-ent, requiring them to consider that person’s viewpoint in intricate detail. On a few of the first takes, the skits de-generated into a scene of giggles and red faces, but by the second or third at-tempts, the consultants had internalized their roles and accurately portrayed the perspective of those self-conscious and misguided students. As a result, they produced some believable and effec-tive scenes. Such an experience al-lowed the consultants to reflect upon and empathize with the viewpoint of their characters in a practical and au-thentic manner.

The topic of the first scene in the video is directed at the student miscon-ception that the Writing Center is staffed by arrogant student writers who are both disinterested in helping others and eager to ridicule their clients’ lack of writing ability. The scene opens with a group of Writing Center con-sultants lounging around the front desk; a few are loudly discussing a party they recently attended while an-other distractedly draws pictures on the dry-erase board. A timid student, Anita, appears in the doorway. After surveying the scene and slowly enter-ing the room, Anita realizes she is be-ing ignored and coughs softly to gain the consultants’ attention. They all turn to face her, and one consultant, Joanne, scoffs, “Quiet, guys. We got one.” Anita apologetically explains that she needs some help with her paper while the consultant waves her over to a table, grabs the paper, and begins to read. After a few moments Joanne be-gins giggling and calls her colleagues over to the table to witness the hope-lessly flawed specimen. When another consultant approaches and, after read-ing the essay, asks the student how she got into college, Anita snatches her pa-per out of the consultant’s hands and runs from the room in tears.

The three scenes described occur in succession and comprise the first half of the video. In the next portion, I serve as narrator and conduct an analy-sis of the three scenes, identifying the misconception involved in each scene and indicating the points at which the consultant and/or the student causes the situation to become negative. Then I explain what should have happened in each scene, why the misconception was erroneous, and how the Writing Center operates in reality. The final portion of the video depicts an accurate scene in the Writing Center, dramatiz-ing the cooperative nature of the con-sultation and emphasizing that the stu-dent retains control of his/her paper at all times.

In the first scene, the consultant, Becky, cheerfully greets the student, Will, and he explains the assignment he has been given as well as the prob-lems he is having with his paper. Becky asks Will to read his paper aloud; afterward, she points out spe-cific parts of the paper she finds effec-tive and asks him if he has particular goals for the session. Will feels that his thesis needs work, and admits that he is unsure whether he develops it fully. Becky agrees that the thesis could be stronger, and they discuss options for revising it. Next, Becky points to an area of the paper in which Will has made a good point but has failed to support it with evidence from the text. The scene fades out as Will is referring to his textbook in search of quotations to add to his essay for support. Both consultant and student are respectful and are focused upon a common goal in this scene as the student’s expecta-tions for the session are fulfilled.

Over the last few years, we have pre-sented the video as an element of Writ-ing Center orientation for numerous English classes and freshman semi-nars. Students’ immediate reactions have been largely positive; of course, the scenarios involved in the video have been exaggerated to highlight the absurdity of the actors’ assumptions, yet the student viewers understand the problem of miscommunication lurking beneath the humor. Consultants also use the video as a foundation for dis-cussion of the Writing Center’s ben-efits and limitations. The film’s comic element communicates informality, which serves as an effective ice breaker to get students to ask questions and take part in a conversation about how the center can become a compo-nent of their writing process. Since the person making the presentation is fre-quently seen in the video, the presenter is thus granted a degree of familiarity with students, which facilitates interac-tion afterward. I’ve found that after showing the video, I’m encountering fewer glazed-over expressions from students, and I’ve even heard a few chuckles at appropriate points; in addi-tion, students seem more willing to ask questions after they’ve seen a model consultation. The film provides a set-ting and a context to accompany the service we’re promoting, so the Writ-ing Center seems more realistic and practical to our audience after they’ve “seen it on TV.”

While we haven’t yet attempted to measure or analyze student response to the video on a broad scale, we have conducted an exercise with two classes. When we showed the video to a group of students as a component of their English 101 class, they were en-couraged to visit the Writing Center at some point during the semester. Then, later, we showed the video to those students again and asked them to re-spond to it, keeping in mind their ini-tial reaction, their actual visit or visits to the Writing Center, and their reac-tion to the video the second time around. The students were asked what they did and didn’t like about the video, and what they would change about it.

In addition to the written feedback we have received, reactions to the video have emerged in numerous fo-rums. More than one student writer has crossed the threshold of our doorway, hesitated, and exclaimed, “I feel like I’m in the video!” Consultants have re-ported that students stop them while walking across campus to compliment them, sometimes with good-natured sarcasm, on their acting abilities. Sev-eral faculty members have commented that their students enjoyed the video and that they learned from it as well. Overall, the video has made a memo-rable impression in the minds of its viewers and thus has had a substantial impact on the Writing Center’s cam-pus-wide profile.

While it may be impossible to locate the exact origin of the Writing Center grapevine, an educational video is one way to confront the confusion and misinformation it can cause. Central to the concept of disproving potential mis-conceptions about our service is the importance of becoming attuned to the informal student conversations that thrive around campus. If we as Writing Center administrators and staff can tap into those conversations and learn to understand and anticipate student per-spectives, problems, and needs, we will be equipped to not only confront misconceptions but to use that conver-sation to our advantage in reaching stu-dents and helping them to become better writers.

Bell, Jim. “Promotional Ideas for Writ-ing Centers.” Writing Lab News-letter 21.1 (September 1996): 13-

Inman, James. “The Writing Center and Student Expectations: A Case Study.” Writing Lab Newsletter

McCann, Todd. “Using Skits to Get the Word Out.” Writing Lab Newsletter 21.1 (September 1996): 5-7.

Call for Proposals March 31, 2001 Worcester, MA

“Literacies, Identities, and Power”

Keynote speaker: Howard Tinberg

The announcement for the conference (including information about accommodations) and the call for proposals are available at<http://www2.clarku.edu/resources/writingcenter/NEWCA/>. Deadline for proposals: December 29, 2000. For further information, contact Anne Ellen Geller, Director of the Writing Center and Writing Program, Clark Uni-versity, 950 Main Street, Worcester, MA 01610; phone: 508-793-7469; e-mail: angeller@clarku.edu

Jean Kiedaisch Wins 2000 NCPTWMaxwell Leadership Award

Congratulations to Jean Kiedaisch, Director of the Academic Support Program at the University of Vermont, for winning the 2000 National Conference on Peer Tutoring in Writing (NCPTW) Ron Maxwell Award for Distin-guished Leadership in Promoting the Collaborative Learning Practices of Peer Tutors in Writing. The award recog-nizes an individual for dedication to and leadership in collaborative learning in writing centers, for aiding students in together taking on more responsibility for their learning; thus, for promoting the work of peer tutors. Its presentation also denotes extraordinary service to the evolution of this Conference.

The Maxwell Award honors leadership that is demonstrated in a variety of ways, including but not limited to the following:

• Building a record of bringing peer tutors to present at the Conference

• Giving service to the NCPTW through hosting the Conference, serving as program chair, leading in the search for future sites, etc.

• Fostering leadership skills among peer tutors

• Showing evidence of leadership in collaborative learning on the home campus

• Developing innovative peer tutoring programs in the home community

• In general, welcoming and meeting new challenges in leading a center guided by a collaborative learning
  philosophy
  

While other aspects of a candidate’s professional performance, e.g., work with professional tutors, writing center research, and publication are respected by the NCPTW and are surely interrelated, this award is intended to recognize meritorious work in an area too little acknowledged.

Calendar for Writing Centers Associations

November 2-4, 2000. National Writing Centers Associa-March 23-24, 2001: East Central Writing Centers Associa-tion in conjunction with the Mid-Atlantic Writing tion, in Granville, OH Centers Association, in Baltimore, MD. Confer-Contact: Cindy Johanek, English Dept, Denison ence website: <http://www.english.udel.edu/wc/ University, Granville, OH 43023. Ph: 740-788-9288; mawca/nwcacon.html> e-mail johanek@denison.edu. Conference

website:<http://www.denison.edu/ecwca2001>

Feb. 16-18, 2001: Southeastern Writing Centers Associa-tion, in Auburn, AL March 31, 2001: Northeast Writing Centers Association, in Contact: Isabelle Thompson, Auburn University Worcester, MA (thompis@groupwise1.duc.auburn.edu) and Contact: Anne Ellen Geller, Writing Center/Writing Glenda Conway, University of Montevallo Program, Clark University, 950 Main Street, Worces-(conwayg@montevallo.edu) ter, MA 01610, (508) 793-7469, angeller@clarku.edu.

Conference website: <http://www2.clarku.edu/

March 3, 2001: Northern California Writing Centesr resources/writingcenter/NEWCA/> Association, in Rohnert Park, CA Contact: Scott L. Miller and Rose Gubele at the 18-20 June 2001: European Writing Center Association, in Sonoma State University Writing Center, 1801 E. Groningen, The Netherlands Cotati Ave., Rohnert Park, CA 94928. Ph: 707-Contact: e-mail: eataw.conference@let.rug.nl; fax: 664-4401; e-mail: writing.center@sonoma.edu. ++31.503636855. Conference website: <http:// Conference website: <http://www.sonoma.edu/ www.hum.ku.dk/formidling/eataw/> programs/writingcenter/ncwca2001>

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