supporting scholarly exchange about communication across the curriculum
The WAC Clearinghouse News and Updates section is a place to find information about current WAC conferences, retreats, calls for submissions, publications, and a variety of other events of interest to the WAC community. The News and Updates section will be updated weekly.
I encourage WAC Clearinghouse visitors and members to send me information to post on the News and Updates pages. If you would like to announce a WAC conference or retreat, advertise a new WAC publication, put out a call for submissions to a WAC book or journal, or have any other news of interest to the WAC community, please send me the information at dlmelzer@aol.com.
-- Dan Melzer
News and Information Editor
Across the Disciplines is pleased to announce the publication of a special issue on "Rewriting Across the Curriculum: Writing Fellows as Agents of Change in WAC," edited by Brad Hughes and Emily B. Hall. To quote from the editors' introduction, "Well-designed Writing Fellows programs – curriculum-based peer tutoring programs, in which undergraduate peer mentors are assigned to work collaboratively with students and faculty in specific writing-intensive courses across the curriculum – can become integral parts of WAC programs in ways that benefit student-writers, faculty, and fellows themselves. Because they embed collaborative learning and contemporary composition pedagogy within courses across the curriculum, Writing Fellows programs also, however, pose various theoretical, pedagogical, and administrative challenges, and they reveal complex intersections of writing, peer collaboration, disciplinary knowledge, and institutional and curricular politics. In this special issue, our contributing authors explore new ways to understand Writing Fellows programs and the connections between them and WAC."
The Table of Contents for this issue includes:
Also, please visit the journal's home page and subscribe to our new RSS feed, compliments of ATD's new Assistant Editor and programming guru, Michael Cripps. With the simple click of a button on your toolbar, you can now be kept immediately up-to-date about new articles as they are published. (Just look at the bottom of the menu bar on the left hand side of the page.)
Georgia Institute of Technology: Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellowship
The Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Literature, Communication, and Culture (LCC) seeks highly qualified PhDs in literature, rhetoric, composition, technical communication, film studies, and related fields for the Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellowship. This program has a special focus in digital pedagogy and cultural studies of science and technology; we encourage candidates with strong interests in these areas to apply.
The fellowship carries a 3/3 teaching assignment of multimodal composition and technical communication courses informed by individual Fellows’ research interests, and the one-year contract is renewable for up to three years. Fellows receive the rank of Instructor with benefits and professional development opportunities:
· Guidance for using technology in the classroom and designing courses
· Seminars on electronic pedagogy and technical communication
· Mentorship from LCC senior faculty
· Colloquia for presenting and refining research with other faculty
· Workshops and support for finding a tenure-track job
Review of applications will continue until positions are filled. To apply, please submit a letter of application, teaching statement, CV, and a file with three letters of recommendation:
Chair, Brittain Fellows Committee
Georgia Institute of Technology
For more information, visit:
www.lcc.gatech.edu/communications/mlb/
The Georgia Institute of Technology is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer. LCC is especially interested in considering applications from women and minority candidates.
Building on the tradition, excitement, and rich learning experiences of past IWCA Summer Institutes . . .
We're delighted to announce the **6th annual IWCA Summer Institute for Writing Center Directors and Professionals**--
Sunday, July 20 - Friday, July 25, 2008
University of Wisconsin-Madison ( virtual tour)
Madison, WI ( info about Madison) ( photo tour of Madison)
Join co-chairs Lisa Ede (Oregon State University), Paula Gillespie (Marquette University), and Brad Hughes (University of Wisconsin-Madison), plus six outstanding leaders (to be announced soon), plus a great group of Madison writing-center professionals and students, plus 50 wonderful participants from around the US and the world for in-depth and critical discussions of these kinds of topics--
Past institutes have been wonderfully enriched by international participants, as well as by participants from two-year colleges and secondary schools.
Madison is gorgeous and fun in the summer. We'll be meeting in a great conference facility on campus (the Pyle Center), right on the shore of Lake Mendota, just a couple blocks from the UW-Madison Writing Center, near the main research library, and practically next door to the outdoor terrace at the student union, a lively summer gathering spot overlooking the lake. And we'll be within easy walking distance of blocks and blocks of all kinds of restaurants, bookstores, funky boutiques, and coffee shops on State St. Madison offers plenty to do for families if you're considering bringing yours--canoes to rent, bike paths to bike, trails to hike, shops to explore . . . a free zoo, free concerts, botanical gardens, a Thai pavilion, tennis courts, volleyball, an arboretum, a geology museum, a great farmers' market, art museums, campus-made ice cream . . . .
Anticipated registration fee: $600 (same as 2007; includes an opening dinner and lunches four days)
Conference-center lodging: $81/night (one block from the conference center; includes breakfast each morning)
--> --> *Participation will be limited to the first 50 registrants.*
Registration opens: **Friday, February 15, 2008**
--> --> n.b.--The institute often fills to capacity two to four months in advance, so if participating in the 2008 institute is a priority for you, be sure to register early. Registration for the 2008 Summer Institute will open on February 15th.
****Have you participated in one of the past institutes?**** If so, would you be willing to post any experiences or advice you'd share with WCenter colleagues who are thinking about attending in 2008?
We'll have more details about leaders, lodging, registration, scholarships, and transportation options in coming months. But we wanted to get this early word out to give those of you who are interested the chance to plan and to line up possible funding.
Questions about the summer 08 institute? Please contact off list co-chair and local host Brad Hughes; Director, Writing Center; Director, Writing Across the Curriculum; University of Wisconsin-Madison ( bthughes@wisc.edu; 608-263-3823).
"New England WAC Directors and Coordinators" meeting, Quinnipiac
University, Hamden, CT. We would like to invite all faculty and
administration who are responsible for WAC programs and initiatives in
the New England area, including New York and New Jersey to a regional
strategy and resource sharing meeting November 16th, 10-3:00 at
Quinnipiac University. Lunch will be provided for everyone. The object
of the meeting is to gauge interest in developing a loose regional
network of WAC programs and initiatives that could meet once or twice
every year to develop support strategies, plan development and resource
exchange strategies and provide some strategic planning to promote WAC
in the area. Please rsvp if interested to Robert Smart, WAC Director at
Quinnipiac University, Robert.Smart@Quinnipiac.edu, 203-582-3325.
Seating, unfortunately, is somewhat limited, so please rsvp promptly.
Thank you."
Please pass information about this position on to anyone who might be interested. The job description below is also posted in full on the University of Alberta Writing Task Force website at http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/wtf/ and on the website of the Dept. of English and Film Studies (see URL below).
_______________________________
Tenured or Tenure-Track Position, Composition and Rhetoric, WAC Director, Department of English and Film Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
The Department of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta invites applications from outstanding candidates in the field of Composition and Rhetoric, specializing in writing-in-the-disciplines and writing-across-the-curriculum. Ideally, depending on credentials and level of experience, the successful candidate will be hired with tenure at the rank of senior Associate or Full Professor. Commencing 1 July 2008, the position will involve teaching at all levels of the curriculum, from first-year to graduate-level courses, but on a reduced teaching load in order to develop and direct a new WAC program. The WAC director would collaborate with departments and faculties across campus interested in writing-to-learn and writing-in-the-disciplines and would play a significant role in the development of writing studies at the university.
Applicants should have an excellent record of research, publication, and teaching. Salary is commensurate with experience and rank. Candidates should send a letter of application, a complete curriculum vitae (with full contact information, including phone numbers and e-mail address), a writing sample (20-page maximum), the names and contact information of at least three referees, and a teaching dossier, including evaluations of teaching performance. Candidates are responsible for ensuring that relevant official transcripts and letters of reference from the three named referees are sent directly to the Department.
Applications received by 8 October 2007, will be guaranteed consideration. All application materials should be sent directly to:
Garrett PJ Epp, Chair
Department of English and Film Studies
3-5 Humanities Centre, University of Alberta
Edmonton AB
Canada T6G 2E5
For further information about the position, or the Department, please contact the Chair by email at garrett.epp@ualberta.ca.
With more than 36,000 students and 12,000 staff, the University of Alberta (www.ualberta.ca) grants almost 7,500 degrees annually to graduates of 200 undergraduate and 170 graduate programs. A researchintensive, medical-doctoral,
in the humanities, social sciences, and fine arts. Within the Faculty the Humanities has particular strengths in humanities computing and in creative writing. The Faculty has also recently helped establish interdisciplinary units such as the China Institute, the Canadian Literature Centre, the Institute for United States Policy Studies, and the Prince Takamado Japan Centre for Teaching and Research. The Department of English and Film Studies itself
Greater Edmonton (www.edmonton.ca), with nearly one million residents in the city and surrounding communities, offers a beautiful, park-like setting on a spectacular river valley. The city is the capital of Alberta, with the lowest provincial tax regime in the country, and has led the nation in economic growth in the past five years. Edmonton is known as Canada's Festival City,
All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply for this position; however, Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority. The University of Alberta hires on the basis of merit. We are committed to the principle of equity in employment. We welcome diversity and encourage applications from all qualified women and men, including persons with disabilities, members of visible minorities, and Aboriginal persons.
Call for Proposals: A special issue of Across the Disciplines, Fall 2008
Writing Technologies and Writing Across the Curriculum: Current Lessons
and Future Trends
Guest editor: Karen J. Lunsford, Writing Program, University of
California at Santa Barbara
In their introduction to WAC for the New Millennium, Susan McLeod and
Eric Miraglia note both challenges and advantages to WAC programs that
may result as teaching with technology becomes widespread. On one hand,
there is a concern that as instructors across campus begin to teach with
technology, they face economic and administrative pressures to adopt
pedagogies inimical to WAC goals. Technology becomes a means to
"deliver instruction" more efficiently to ever larger classes, and thus
the "banking model of education" may become privileged. On the other
hand, technologies and uses for technologies are myriad, and instructors
interested in WAC have always been adept at creating "cognitively rich"
activities, spaces, and media for and with their students. Moreover,
the technologies and norms for producing, revising, responding to, and
distributing writing-whether to the general public or within the
disciplines-rapidly change, and instructors respond to those changes.
This special issue of ATD will explore how and why WAC/WID initiatives
incorporate writing technologies, negotiate (or not) the calls for
efficiency, and adapt to evolving disciplinary and cultural norms for
writing.
We invite proposals for articles that explore questions such as the
following, as well as others related to the topic of Writing
Technologies and WAC/WID.
ECAC (Electronic Communication Across the Curriculum) programs
have been established for some time. Have the distinctions between ECAC and
WAC/WID collapsed in today's academy? If not, what distinctions remain?
If so, what are the consequences for programs today and in the future?
And what lessons regarding efficiency and ingenuity have we learned from
ECAC?
Many campuses have adopted or are planning to adopt course
management systems (Moodle, Blackboard/WebCT, Sakai, TOPIC, etc.). The CMSs offer various technologies for writing and writing instruction. How does the
use of a CMS intersect (or not) with WAC/WID initiatives?
WAC/WID initiatives often involve Writing Centers and Online
Writing Labs (OWLs). What does research have to say about the intersections among WAC/WID programs, Writing Centers and/or OWLs, and writing technologies?
Are new models developing?
How are WAC/WID programs addressing the increase in multimodal
forms of communication?
How are WAC/WID programs addressing changes in disciplinary and
cultural norms for writing (e.g., new publication or distribution formats,
attitudes toward intellectual property, the use of social networking
software, etc.)?
Faculty across the curriculum often develop technologies for
writing and for teaching (and assessing) writing-with or without consulting writing
specialists. For example, faculty have advanced technologies such as
calibrated peer review; plagiarism detection services; clickers;
websites and blogs with writing advice; citation managers; and so on. How do
WAC/WID programs intersect with these faculty initiatives? What
strategies do programs adopt when faculty initiatives are at odds with WAC/WID
goals?
Do writing technologies enable multi-institutional and/or
multi-national collaborations among WAC/WID programs? What models, if any, are
evolving for such collaborations?
What does research about WAC/WID programs have to tell us about
questions of student and faculty access to technologies and/or about their use of
technologies?
How should we best train instructors across the curriculum to
use writing technologies?
What are the effects of computerized assessments of writing
(e.g., ETS's e-rater) on WAC/WID?
What technologies aside from computers should WAC/WID programs
consider?
What innovations on the horizon are likely to impact programs? What
technologies should WAC/WID programs actively develop or take part in
developing over the next ten years?
As technologies become familiar, they often become invisible.
What writing technologies deserve to be revisited at this point?
We're eager to read innovative work that critically explores the
foundations, implications, and influence of writing technologies and
WAC/WID initiatives - work that is theoretically informed, that offers
original research data, and that builds on appropriate literature
reviews.
Although descriptions of specific WAC/WID initiatives are welcome, they
should be situated within an analysis of a larger issue(s). We welcome
inquiries about ideas for proposals.
Deadline for proposals: August 1, 2007
Notification of Acceptance: October 2007
Manuscripts Due: February 1, 2008
Publication: Fall 2008
Proposal format: Please submit a one-page proposal explaining your
topic, the research and theoretical base on which you will draw, and your plans
for the structure of your article. Proposals and manuscripts should
follow APA documentation style, which is the standard for Across the
Disciplines.
Send your proposal electronically (in MS Word format) to the guest
editor (klunsford@writing.ucsb.edu) and Michael Pemberton
(michaelp@georgiasouthern.edu), the editor of ATD. Please be sure to
include your full contact information.
Composing a Community
A History of Writing Across the Curriculum
Writing across the curriculum is experiencing a renaissance in institutions across the country. People starting or restarting WAC programs will want to read Composing a Community: A History of Writing Across the Curriculum.
Composing a Community is not only a history of early WAC programs but also of how the people developing those programs were in touch with one another, exchanging ideas and information, forming first a network and then a community. Composing a Community captures the stories of pioneers like Elaine Maimon, Toby Fulwiler, and others, giving readers first-hand accounts from those who were present at the creation of this new movement. David Russell’s introduction sets this emergent narrative into relief.
Susan H. McLeod and Margot Iris Soven, themselves pioneers in WAC history, have assembled some of its most eloquent voices in this collection: Charles Bazerman, John C. Bean, Toby Fulwiler, Anne Herrington, Carol Holder, Peshe C. Kuriloff, Linda Peterson, David R. Russell, Christopher Thaiss, Barbara E. Walvoord, and Sam Watson. Their style is personal, lively, and informal as the authors succeed in putting their personal memories in the larger context of WAC studies.
The 2007 Assessment Institute
November 4-6, 2007
The Westin Indianapolis
Indianapolis, Indiana
Pre-Institute Workshops: November 4, 2007
Institute Dates: November 5-6, 2007
To propose a workshop or poster please complete the Call for Proposal form by March 15, 2007 attaching a 50-word abstract and a 1-2 page extended description in WORD format only and email to: Karen E. Black at kblack@iupui.edu.
NOTE: Preference will be given in the selection process to those proposals that include information about assessment findings and their use to improve student learning or institutional processes or services.
SPECIAL TRACKS FOR - Track plenary sessions and workshops emphasizing assessment in:
CONTINUING OUR TRADITIONS - We will present sessions emphasizing in:
In-depth Learning with Opportunities with Scholars/Practitioners for all Faculty and Administrators:
Pre-Institute Workshops: Extended learning opportunites with experienced practitioners.
Best Practices Fair: Featuring assessment instruments, methods, and approaches from test developers and campus practitioners in higher education.
Concurrent Workshops: In-depth sessions with leaders of successful assessment initiatives including:
For well more than a decade now, researchers have been reporting how in the act of drafting we recognize and solve rhetorical problems -- how we evaluate and synthesize sources, set local rhetorical goals, then seek to achieve them. But if the literature on solving such problems is thick, our understanding of how we articulate the substantive problem that occasions our efforts to solve them is quite thin. By "substantive problem" I do not mean the local and ongoing struggle toward the discovery and articulation of meaning, but the significant question whose answer justifies the effort, the problem in the world or mind whose solution repays our time spent writing and our readers' spent reading. We criticize the writing of our students and colleagues on many grounds, but none is more common -- or devastating -- than the observation that they have failed not just to solve a problem, but even to pose one that we think "interesting." And as teachers, we experience no failure more common than our inability to explain what we mean by "pose" or "interesting" or "problem" and what it is about a text that elicits such criticism.Williams' monograph offers much to writers and teachers of writing.
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