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About the Writing Center

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It is easy to forget that public writing is a dialogue with real readers. Writing Center consultants are those real readers, experienced and invested readers, who can help establish an authentic audience and purpose for writers, especially for students who often have difficulty conceptualizing assignments as anything more than dreaded tasks. We like to talk to students about their ideas and their writing. Conversation goes a long way in improving both thinking and writing. Writing teacher and scholar Kenneth Bruffee notes that conversation is “the origin of thought” (207). Like all ideas, Bruffee’s own observations about writing and thinking come from years of dialoguing with others. Bruffee writes that conversation stimulates reflective and critical thought and that we experience and learn in “direct social exchange with other people” (208). Thus, the ideas we write down in academic papers are in large measure the result of our experiences and interactions with others. Just as in conversation, our written words are intended for others to ‘hear.’

 

The Writing Center serves all members of the VCU community – students, faculty, and staff - in their ongoing efforts to become better thinkers and writers. We train consultants to be good facilitators, to use questioning to help writers clarify their thinking and to guide them through the writing process. Our one-on-one, thirty minute consultations help writers conceptualize and develop ideas, manage the demands of academic writing, revise papers for depth and clarity and learn how to recognize and resolve writing errors.

 

In our experience, when students come to the center close to assignment due dates - at that final “editing” stage – we find our range for feedback is limited, reducing many options for revision and improvement. 

 

Students who benefit the most from our consultations make it a habit to come to the center more than once. These students come at the beginning for brainstorming and planning, in the middle for developing and organizing, and then at the end for revising, editing, and proofreading. 

 

We hope to see you at the Writing Center soon.

Patty Strong, Director

prstrong@vcu.edu

(804) 827-8109

 

Bruffee, Kenneth A. "Peer Tutoring and the 'Conversation of Mankind.'" Writing Center Theory and Practice. Ed. Robert W. Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner. Neidham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon, 2001. 206 - 219.

 

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