15.3: Perspective on the Writing Center is here!
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Praxis is proud to bring you our summer 2018 issue, 15.3: Perspective on the Writing Center, today! Just in time to start thinking about the Fall.
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CFP: Praxis Special Issue on Race & The Writing Center Submission Deadline 8/15
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The submission deadline for our Special Issue on Race & The Writing Center is just three weeks away! Click through for the complete CFP. All submissions and questions should come to us at praxisuwc@gmail.com.
Read MoreWriting Centers and the Rhetoric of Toleration
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The work of tolerance and acceptance, and the work of teaching writing, is getting people to think about their preconceived notions. This is why we should help those students we disagree with. We can’t change their worldview, but the writing center consultation has the potential to encourage students to start asking more and better questions about what they think and why they think it, and we can, if this isn’t too arrogant, serve as a space where students can enlarge their understanding.
Read MoreAnswering the Unaskable: Personal Questions in Campus Visits
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Pax Gutierrez-Neal returns for Part II of her on-campus interview advice, this time tackling the thornier issue of dealing with personal questions.
Read MoreSurviving the Campus Visit: Compiled Tips from a Repeat Visitor
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Pax Gutierrez-Neal, our pal, out-going Assistant Program Coordinator at UT’s University Writing Center, and recent survivor of the job market kicks off Axis’s summer blogging with some wisdom for those facing campus interviews in the coming year.
Read MoreSpring 2018 Issue: "Support in the Writing Center"
/We are pleased to announce that the spring 2018 issue of Praxis is now available!
Thank you very much to the authors and editorial board that contributed to this issue, and we hope you enjoy reading it.
Praxis Special Issue on Race & The Writing Center, Call for Papers
/Axis will return soon with our regular posting, but we're excited, and we want to take every opportunity to promote the CFP for our upcoming special issue, in collaboration with our co-editors! See the full CFP below:
Praxis: A Writing Center Journal
Call For Papers: Race & The Writing Center
For a special Spring 2019 issue, Praxis: A Writing Center Journal welcomes submissions related to the theme of “Race & the Writing Center.”
Read MoreWhat is the Mission of a "SafeZone" Tutor?
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Galen David Bunting, a graduate student and writing center consultant at Oklahoma State University, discusses the importance of SafeZone tutors for the LGBTQA community.
Read MoreEmotional and Creative Intelligence: Tutoring Through “Rests, Riffs, and Raptures”
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"As an artist and what Steve Sherwood calls an 'artist-as-tutor,' I am both 'hunter' and 'maker' of kairotic situations. By following creative impulses, I encounter singular opportunities to nudge writers down paths of creative inquiry and emboldened writing, which I define as writing instilled with boldness, authentic heart and purpose."
Read MoreGroup Tutoring in the Writing Center
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"Should writing centres encourage students to sign up for group sessions, or should they focus on promoting one-to-one sessions? What are the benefits of working with multiple students, and what is negative about this work? In many disciplines, such as math and science, group sessions are quite common; why is this different for writing?
Read MoreFeeling Good about Difficulty in Writing Center Stories
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Jason Hoppe—founding director of the West Point Writing Program, Writing Fellows Program, and Mounger Writing Center—argues for why we should tell more stories about the difficulties of writing center work.
Read MoreKnowing When to Shift Our Stance
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One of our managing co-editors considers a recent interview in The Chronicle of Higher Education, "What's Wrong With Writing Centers," from her own experience.
Read MoreWriting Centers as Spaces for Dialogue about Social Justice
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"We work with writers to establish their ideas, restructure their argument, and clarify their writing. But as we unpack their ideas in these ways, we also unpack our own assumptions, as well as the assumptions and stereotypes that are prevalent in our society.
The writing centre allows us the time and the space to connect and to talk through matters of social justice, to have these conversations that we wouldn’t be having otherwise."
Read MoreWelcome to Praxis: Interview with Tristin Hooker
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"What I loved most about working in the writing center at my old campus was watching it become a place that students incorporated into their plans and thought of as part of their process."
Read MoreTeaching Teaching Statements
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In our last post for the semester, Pax Gutierrez-Neal (UT grad student and Assistant Program Coordinator here at the UWC) has some insightful things to say about teaching and teaching statements, one of the most feared job materials in the academic world.
Read MoreCreating a Cabinet of Curiosity: My Scrap Writing Collection
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Dr. Danielle Koupf, Assistant Teaching Professor in writing at Wake Forest University, advocates for the pedagogical use of scrap writing.
Read MoreModels in Intro to Rhetoric
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Dr. Oren M. Abeles, Assistant Professor in Rhetoric and Composition at Michigan Tech University, discusses the rhetorical tradition and teaching in a new environment.
Read MoreDrawing the Compositional Lines in Consultations
/Managing Editor Sarah Riddick reflects on supporting the creative process as a consultant.
Read MoreBlade Runner 2049, Memory, and the Act of Writing
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A former Praxis managing editor ruminates on the new Blade Runner film, memory, and the act of writing.
Read MoreThe Non-Directive Directive?
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Image by TeroVesalainen from Pixabay
Apologies for this week's blog post title. Like many other people across the globe, I was utterly absorbed by the premiere of Star Trek: Discovery last night and am still recovering.
Lately, I have been thinking a lot about the place of directive versus non-directive tutoring in writing center consultations. As it has been with every other Praxis editor, I began my time at the UWC as a consultant. Though my days are now full of article proofs, lengthy e-mail chains about proper MLA formatting, and conference-related considerations (such as IWCA in November), I once spent my time working with students one-on-one, helping them to improve their writing projects and processes however I could. Oftentimes, I felt constrained by the core writing center principle of non-directive guidance; a good deal of recent writing center research deals with this point of tension and its relationship to both language acquisition and identity politics (e.g. Horner et al., Canagarajah, etc.). We have even published some excellent work on these topics and similar intersections of theory and practice, such as Beatrice Mendez Newman's piece on tutoring translingual writers.
Indeed, it seems as though our field is experiencing something of a sea change when it comes to balancing tried-and-true principles with an increased awareness of the populations our centers serve. So, with that in mind, what struggles have YOU experienced when trying to balance a non-directive tutoring approach with the exigencies presented by different student populations and assignment types? Feel free to chime in below, in the comments section.