By Holly Berkowitz, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga–There is a widespread perception that TikTok, the popular video-sharing social media platform, is primarily a tool of distraction where one mindlessly scrolls through bite-sized bits of content. However, due to the viewer’s ability to engage with short-form video content, it is undeniable that TikTok is also a platform from which users gain information; whether this means following a viral dance tutorial or learning how to fold a fitted sheet, TikTok houses millions of videos that serve as instructional tutorials that provides tips or how-tos for its over one billion active users. […]

By Nattaporn Luangpipat, Samitha Senanayake, and Hadis Ghaedi, University of Wisconsin-Madison–At the 2022 International Writing Centers Association (IWCA) Conference in Vancouver, BC we  co-presented “Affordances and Challenges of International Writing Center Tutors.” Our roundtable attempted to understand the experiences of international writing center tutors, covering the affordances they bring and the challenges they face. We wanted to discuss how writing center stakeholders can raise awareness of international tutors and promote realistic expectations while reshaping their pedagogy to make international tutors aware of themselves as an asset and providing them with training and strategies to deal with possible challenges. […]

By Thomas Deans, Noah Praver, and Alexander Solod, University of Connecticut—Even those far from college writing programs are talking more about writing these days, and we all know why: AI. Some disciplinary associations, including CCCC, MLA, and AWAC, have formed task forces on AI, posted working papers, or issued position statements (nothing yet from IWCA). Some writing centers have started creating materials to guide tutors. And all of us will be mulling over how to handle […]

By Kerri Rinaldi, Immaculata University—Over the past few semesters, the tutors at the writing center I direct have expressed a desire and a need for more training on supporting multilingual writers. I heard their requests, but at first, I wasn’t sure how much additional training time to devote to this topic. After all, our small campus (2,500 students) has an even smaller population of international students and multilingual writers (just 1-5% of all students). And, my tutors […]

By Mario Ramirez-Arrazola, University of Oklahoma—In writing center work, It is hard to refrain from thinking about the writing center as the client’s endpoint, and yet it is important to recognize the varied movements and progressions that bring writers to us. Before entering the space of the writing center, they have had to travel through a journey of self-contained experiences, which affected them in either grand or negligible ways. When they walk out, perhaps never to be seen again, their stories don’t stop there. […]

By Joseph Franklin, New York City College of Technology—I am writing this at a bamboo table and simple folding chair combo. I am using Microsoft Word on a Mac laptop mounted on a Roost laptop stand and using a Logitech ERGO K860 keyboard that supports my wrists. I am playing instrumental music by Grandbrothers through Sennheiser PXC 550 noise canceling headphones and I have notifications turned off on all devices. These tools (and others) have been curated […]

By Dr. Yvonne Lee, Lehigh University—Working with graduate writers is currently a topic being discussed in the literature, and much of what is being discussed is the uniqueness and liminality of the situation in which graduate student writers find themselves (Jewell & Cheatle, 2021; Lawrence & Zawacki, 2018; Russell-Pinson & Jafarian, 2020; Simpson et al., 2016). To many, graduate writers should already be experts in writing in their fields. To others, they are novice insiders who are still learning the practices and expectations of their fields.  […]

By Diego Alegría—How can we teach writing beyond questions around grammar, but through its very own instruments and problems? This question has guided the way I approach my writing center sessions. Here, I hope to trace a tentative answer by describing and analyzing a mentorship session that focused on the use of passive voice. In this session […]

By Susanne Treiber, Madison College and Karen Best, University of Wisconsin-Madison—Just a bike ride away from the renowned UW Writing Center lives a hidden gem of a neighbor–the Writing Center at Madison Area Technical College, a 2-year institution with a mission to “provide open access to quality higher education that fosters lifelong learning and success” (“Madison College: Our Culture”). Within this progressive community college resides a writing center, where an average of 33% of its visitors over the past 7 years identify as […]

By Stacie Klinowski, University of Massachusetts Amherst—”I think about that reading all the time when I’m tutoring. Literally all the time,” one undergraduate tutor told me as we discussed one of her sessions that I had observed. The reading in question, “Peer Tutoring: A Contradiction in Terms?” by John Trimbur, was something that this tutor had read two years previously when taking a class to prepare to work in our writing center. 

By Molly Ryan, Virginia Tech—I remember my first day of writing center tutoring distinctly: I can see the desk I selected, third from the front by one of the large windows on the outer wall of the second floor of Newman library at Virginia Tech. I remember the brightly colored Crayola markers laid out for tutors, selecting the black marker to write my name on my identifying tag, and then […]

By Arawomo Oluwayinka—I vividly remember working with two of my students, and the laughter we shared has always made these sessions memorable. In the first session, the student was struggling with incorporating comments from her advisor. In the other, the student was tired of the course content and the TA was not helping matters. Both students were working on serious writing projects and had serious writing concerns. However, we were able to navigate through it with our shared laughter […]