Call for Proposals

The Campus Writing Program at the University of Missouri-Columbia is pleased to host the Seventh National WAC Conference, May 20-22, 2004, in St. Louis, Missouri.

This biennial event is the largest U.S. conference dedicated to writing across the curriculum (WAC) and writing in the disciplines (WID). It is typically of interest to people using writing to improve teaching and learning: faculty, administrators, and students from post-secondary institutions, as well as faculty and administrators from secondary schools.

This year's theme, "WAC From an International Perspective," is intended to draw attention to the myriad ways that WAC and WID are conceptualized, understood, and used both within and beyond the U.S.

Over the last thirty years in the U.S., the WAC educational movement has grown steadily, primarily in higher education and, to a lesser extent, at the secondary level. Over the same period, the language across the curriculum (LAC) movement in the U.K. has also grown, primarily at the secondary level. More recently, LAC has begun to appear at the post-secondary level.

More notable, though, is an increased interest worldwide in higher education's use of writing as a tool for teaching and learning.

We invite the sharing of diverse points of view to enrich our common goals of improved teaching, learning, writing, and thinking. We hope that the dialectic that emerges from a cross-cultural conversation about academic writing will stimulate critical reflection on standard practices and catalyze new research questions.

The University of Missouri-Columbia gratefully acknowledges generous grants from the John S. Knight Institute for Writing in the Disciplines at Cornell University , Jonathan Monroe, Director, the Department of English, Washington University , David A. Lawton, Chair, and the Cain Project in Engineering and Professional Communication at Rice University, Linda Driskill, Director. These grants are allowing the conference to produce a video tape for Plenary Session 1 and to host Richard Bates, Gail Hawisher, and Cynthia Selfe for Plenary Sessions 2 and 3.

Although our conference theme focuses on international perspectives on teaching and using academic writing as a tool for learning, proposals are also welcome that address WAC/WID concerns within U.S. higher education.

The following questions may help inspire proposals for the WAC 2004 Conference. Questions are intended to suggest possibilities, not limit creativity.

• How might theories and practices of teaching writing transfer from one culture to another? From one institution to another? What impediments exist in such transfer? What advantages obtain?
• Given WAC/WID’s typically “decentered” classroom approaches, should/could these pedagogies be promulgated in cultures that honor teachers’ unquestioned authority? Can decentered approaches be adapted rather than adopted?
• What can teachers of writing in the disciplines learn from teachers of foreign languages (L2)? How can WID theorists and practitioners build on scholarship from L2 teaching?
• What knowledge about writing centers and tutoring can be shared, within cultures or cross-culturally?
• What can WAC, WID, LAC, and CAC (communication across the curriculum) learn from each other?
• What rewards or incentives can be offered for using writing as a tool for teaching—in the U.S. and elsewhere?
• How might intellectual property be understood in different cultural and disciplinary contexts?
• What forms of individual and programmatic assessment of academic writing are most helpful for improving teaching and learning? For accreditation?

Proposals will be evaluated on the basis of:

• A clearly defined problem or issue
• A practical or theoretical response to the issue
• Justification—empirical or theoretical—for the response
• Awareness of limitations, constraints, and open questions
• Potential relevance to both the practice and theory of the teaching of writing

Dates to keep in mind:

• October 31, 2003 - deadline for submitting proposals
• January 15, 2004 - notification to proposers
• March 1, 2004 - deadline for conference presenters to accept and pre-register
• April 13, 2004 - deadline for regular conference registration (late fee applies after this date)
• April 13, 2004 - deadline for hotel accommodations at conference rate

Direct inquiries towac2004@missouri.edu or contact:

WAC 2004 Conference
Campus Writing Program
325 GCB
University of Missouri
Columbia, MO 65211
573-882-4881 (office, M-F 8-5)
573-884-5438 (fax)

Proposals must be submitted via the online conference Web site.