Writing and Reading Program
The Writing and Reading Program at Western New England University is committed to the intellectual growth and development of all members of the academic community in the areas of writing and analytic reading. Stressing process pedagogy, the program promotes writing, reading, and critical thinking skills across the curriculum through a series of integrated support services that are available to all students and faculty:
- Confidential and dependable writing support services offer one-on-one tutoring for all students.
- Analytic reading support identifies reading strengths and weaknesses and offers placement in one-credit labs that promote strategies for improved reading skills.
- Support for non-native speakers of English includes composition classes geared toward English language development as well as one-on-one tutoring with a bilingual specialist.
- Faculty support across the disciplines emphasizes writing-to-learn and reading-to-learn strategies.
- Assistive technologies provide alternative approaches to writing and reading and also acknowledge diverse learning styles.
- The Writing Resource Center staff is available to help students with their writing concerns and to assist students with technology available in the center. The Writing Center facility is open 56 hours per week.
The Writing Center
In order to foster process pedagogy, tutors in the Writing Center are trained to approach each session as a dialogue, always beginning with content-based concerns (also known as "higher order concerns"). This means that grammatical and mechanical errors ("lower order concerns") take a backseat to issues of thesis development, paper unity, rhetorical strategy, etc.
At the Writing Center we acknowledge that not all concerns within a given paper or project can be addressed in one single tutoring session. Teaching the writing process requires not only an incremental but also a developmental approach. We hope to establish a pattern of multiple visits to the center, thus encouraging students to approach writing as a process of critical thinking.
At the Writing Center, we believe that it is not acceptable to have a grammatically/mechanically correct paper that lacks a strong controlling idea and/or a purposeful approach to organization. Neither do we encourage final drafts that turn on salient ideas with no consideration for the structure, cohesion, or grammatical correctness of the English language.
What the Writing Center does NOT do:
- We do not proofread or edit papers.
- We do not consider résumés.
- We do not rewrite papers for students.
Writing and Reading Program Collaborative
- Christine Crutchfield, Director of Composition and the Writing Center
- Linda Oleksak, Director of Reading Support Services
- Sandra Navarro, Chair of the Department of English and Cultural Studies