International to Intersectional: How Thinking about International Writing Center Tutors Can Make a Writing Center More Inclusive

Graduate Students, Multilingual Writers, Writing Center Conference, Writing Center Tutors

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. […]

September 19, 2023

large, round stained glass window in the ceiling surrounded by white ceiling details and a level of bookshelves and seating for students

Creating Space: Building a Writing Center for Graduate Students

Covid, Graduate Students, Writing Center Tutors

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. […]

September 6, 2023

A pile of English grammar books, including The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language by Huddleston & Pullum; Hurford’s The Origins of Grammar; The Grammar Book by Larsen-Freeman & Celce-Mucia; Syntactic Theory by Sag, Wasow, & Bender; Grammar for English Language Teachers (2nd edition) by Parrott; The English Interrogative Pronouns by Karlberg; Practical English Usage (4th edition) y Swan; The English Verb by Lewis; Aspects of a Theory of Syntax by Chomsky; Fowler’s Modern English Usage (2nd edition); and Modern English Syntax by Onions.

A Lesson from Passive Voice

Graduate Students, Multilingual Writers, Peer Tutoring, Tutorial Talk and Methods, Writing Center Tutors

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 […]

July 18, 2023

a vertical oil painted rainbow spectrum with red on the left and purple on the right.

The Queer Tutor: Affirmation of Identity Through Writing Center Work

Diversity and Inclusion, Graduate Students, Peer Tutoring, Queer Theory, Tutorial Talk and Methods, Writing Center pedagogy, Writing Center Tutors, Writing Centers

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 […]

May 2, 2023

Group of young adults with laptops sit together and laugh

The Place of Laughter in Writing Center Spaces

Graduate Students, Peer Tutoring, Tutorial Talk and Methods, Writing Center Tutors

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 […]

April 18, 2023

Empathetic Listening and Collaborative Learning: My Experience as an International Writing Center Tutor

Collaborative Learning, Diversity and Inclusion, Graduate Students, Multilingual Writers, Peer Tutoring, Social Justice, Tutor Publications, Tutorial Talk and Methods, Writing Center Tutors, Writing Centers

By Kuhelika Ghosh—When I work with international undergraduate students at the University of Wisconsin–Madison Writing Center, I often find myself taking a moment or two to acknowledge the specific challenges that the student shares with me. During some of these conversations, I end up briefly sharing my own experiences during my undergraduate degree when I struggled with writing within certain academic genres as a new international student. I still remember the first time I […]

March 21, 2023

I’m So Sorry, English Is Not My First Language

Diversity and Inclusion, Graduate Students, Multilingual Writers, Social Justice, Writing Center Tutors, Writing Centers

By Robert Zatryb, University of Connecticut—‘I’m so sorry, English is not my first language.’ Have you ever heard this sentence in your tutoring sessions? Have you read it among the information provided by the student writer ahead of the appointment? I certainly did, with a surprising regularity and always in a similar, apologetic wording. To some tutors and administrators, this tone might go unnoticed and be trivialised, but it actually should be very striking. The writers are […]

March 7, 2023

Spotlighting the Role of Shadowing Co-Teaching Sessions in a Writing Center’s Outreach Program

Graduate Students, Outreach, Tutor Training, Writing Center Tutors, Writing Centers

By Nattaporn Luangpipat—The outreach program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Writing Center was established to promote a strong culture of writing across the curriculum by supporting faculty, staff, and students in all disciplines and programs throughout the University. It connects the Writing Center and various campus communities to share our skilled instruction and learn from our partners about their areas of expertise. The Writing Center offers four major kinds of outreach […]

January 24, 2023

Five people holding up a colorful, cutout speech bubble that covers their face.

Illuminating the Writer Behind the Draft: Insights on Written Feedback Appointments

Graduate Students, Multilingual Writers, Technology, The Online Writing Center, Writing Center pedagogy, Writing Center Research, Writing Center Tutors

By Samitha Senanayake—After completing an asynchronous feedback appointment and glancing, often with tired eyes, at the neat blocks of paragraphs in the global or summary comment, I feel good: job done! But it’s only recently that I’ve begun to wonder what the same paragraphs might make a student feel. Even before they read the text, what must feedback in the form of paragraphs feel like, sound like? In the same way, does a track change on Microsoft Word […]

November 29, 2022

Vancouver, British Columbia city scape against a bright cloudy sky and reflective lake

Writing Center Affiliates’ Recent Conference Participation

Diversity and Inclusion, Events, Graduate Students, IWCA, Multilingual Writers, Peer Tutoring, Social Justice, Writing Center Conference, Writing Center pedagogy, Writing Center Research, Writing Center Tutors

By Ellen Cecil-Lemkin—The first in-person International Writing Centers Association (IWCA) Conference since 2019 was held from October 26 to 29, 2022 at Vancouver, British Columbia. Sherry Wynn Perdue, IWCA president, wrote, “Attended by almost 500 members from all over the world, our annual conference offered presenters and attendees an opportunity to converse and conspire, so we may reconceive our roles as […]

November 8, 2022

Another Word

From the Writing Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

Category: Graduate Students