{"id":13387,"date":"2022-05-03T12:17:24","date_gmt":"2022-05-03T17:17:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dept.writing.wisc.edu\/blog\/?p=13387"},"modified":"2026-09-09T13:40:46","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T18:40:46","slug":"walking-the-walk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dept.writing.wisc.edu\/blog\/walking-the-walk\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cAre We Walking the Walk?\u201d: Undertaking Writing Center Assessment"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Angela J. Zito<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assessment is not everyone\u2019s favorite thing to talk about, but it is one of mine. In this post, I\u2019ll try to convince you that writing center assessment can be a worthwhile and invigorating process that places the things you care about most\u2014inclusivity, student learning, accessibility, tutor education\u2014front and center. Assessment projects urge us to ask ourselves, \u201cAre we walking the walk, as well as talking the talk?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is, after all, the core project of assessment: to make apparent the gap between intended and actual effects. Of particular importance\u2014for us at UW-Madison and for all writing centers\u2014is the endeavor to identify gaps between values and practice, between commitments and policies. Writing center assessment provides a means for identifying and, more importantly, closing (however incrementally) gaps between professed values of inclusivity and the real effects that policy and practice have on the people we engage with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the sections that follow, I share about our Writing Center\u2019s ongoing development of an assessment project that aims to initiate long-term, iterative evaluation of our programs\u2019 various enactments of inclusive, accessible, and antiracist values.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Reviewing the Literature<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Our process of developing an assessment project has been anything but linear\u2014which, as we\u2019ve learned from the literature on writing center assessment, is not uncommon! Even engaging with scholarship on the topic has been a recurring part of the process, not something that we \u201ccompleted\u201d before beginning in earnest.<\/p>\n\n\n

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We found that Ellen Schendel and William Macauley\u2019s Building Writing Center Assessments that Matter<\/em> offers a helpful overview of assessment research in writing center studies (as does Miriam Gofine\u2019s review \u201cHow Are We Doing?\u201d). In their book, Schendel and Macauley also provide accounts of their own assessment projects, which demonstrate that any center\u2019s approach can (indeed should) be unique to its own local context and purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To help us develop an assessment that would be attuned to the idiosyncrasies of our Writing Center, we adopted the three-step approach Macauley outlines in his chapter \u201cGetting from Values to Assessable Outcomes\u201d:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Identify what your center values<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Identify indicators of those values<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Identify assessable outcomes<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    In this approach, we would begin by scoping out to consider our Center\u2019s overarching mission. From there, we would focus our attention on increasingly specific aspects of our Center\u2019s work that we believe carry out that mission. Ultimately, we would arrive at \u201cassessable\u201d outcomes\u2014that is, outcomes we would be able to observe and evaluate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Of course, each of Macauley\u2019s three steps is a significant undertaking of its own, prompting us to seek out additional models and guidance along the way. For instance, we found Geist and Geist\u2019s article \u201cDrafting a Writing Center: Defining Ourselves Through Outcomes and Assessment\u201d valuable in navigating the first step (\u201cIdentify what [our] center values\u201d). Geist and Geist make a strong case for thinking expansively about the work of a writing center\u2014that is, recognizing that we do (and should assess) so much more than tutoring. They propose five levels of inquiry to help a writing center define itself expansively:<\/p>\n\n\n\n