Writing center tutors know that improving writing skills requires sustained effort over a long period of time. They also know that motivation--the drive to actively invest in sustained effort toward a goal--is essential for writing improvement. Because motivation can direct attention toward particular tasks and increase both effort and…

During class discussions, the author's fellow consultants would often lament consultations that could have gone better if they had only known the "rules" of how to handle the situation. They perceived that there were acceptable and unacceptable ways to approach certain situations, rather than a range of flexible choices. The author began to…

Today, nearly forty years after writing centers first began to proliferate, it is worthwhile to reflect on the themes that emerge from empirical material surrounding writing center assessments, for reflecting on these themes may help administrators to refine current assessment practices and scholars to redirect their research. The goal of this…

In 1998, Catherine Prendergast observed that, although composition scholars sometimes identify a subject by race or ethnicity, "the legacy of racism in this country which participates in sculpting all identities--white included--is more often than not absent from the analysis of that writer's linguistic capabilities or strategies." Since then,…

One of the virtues of writing centers is that they compensate for the alienation of writing. If the canonical literate encounter is one where writer and reader meet only through the medium of the text, then the writing center consultation restores immediacy to written communication. Like an author-attended rehearsal, writing center consultation…

In this article, the author focuses on one student, Margie, who sought to write about her experience with workplace sexual harassment but who also struggled as she wrote with competing off-stage voices. Those voices--from the conversations in her classrooms, former workplace, a campus women's group, newspapers, and the televised Anita…

Over the past two decades, writing centers have steadily been expanding services and materials they offer online. The way students write and communicate about their writing continues to change, and the writing center has increasingly been looked upon as a site through which technology and writing have the ability to converge in the form of…

Discusses general issues related to attitudes towards writing, which may be of interest to those working with English-as-a-second-language students, especially students coming from educational settings where writing is not traditionally taught. Presents the practice of the Writing Center at Central uropean University, one of the few centers in…

Examines how art and design students' approaches to writing are potentially enriched by their creative approach to design. Suggests ways in which the art and design training could be exploited and used as a resource to produce strategies that work with all students. Concludes the key is to ask students about their creative preferences and build on…

Considers if reflection on practice would be effective as ongoing training of tutors. Discusses the designing of a series of guided reflection exercises and examines the impact. Finds that it is difficult to use guided reflection to foster more reflective thinking by tutors and to change basic tutoring approaches. (SG)

Advocates the move to collaboration in writing centers. Describes three different ideas of writing centers (as "storehouse,""garret," and "Burkean parlor"). Discusses where the focus of control lies in each. Urges careful examination of what collaboration means and how definitions of it locate control, to avoid reproducing the status quo. (SR)