Spring 2013 Graduate Student Colloquium

Why work at the Writing Center? Why put in the time and effort to help other student writers work on their homework when you could be working on yours? Why stay working at any Writing Center longer than a semester or two?  Most seasoned writing center consultants know the challenges of thinking critically with students as we help them interpret assignments and craft specific language to communicate their critical thoughts in response to the assignment. The energy we spend in the Writing Center can sometimes even make it difficult to produce our own school work and yet we come  back.

Why We Need to Brainstorm (and 4 Methods to Try Out)

I have a confession to make. I hate to write.

Let me take that back: I love the idea of writing. I love writing when I know what I’m doing. I just hate, hate, hate, hate staring down at an open, empty word document or a crisp, clean, blank, lined piece of paper, pen hovering expectantly in my hand, the emptiness mocking my lack of language. I’ve been a writing consultant for three years now, and I still forget to engage in one of the most basic tools I prescribe for other writers who, like me, avoid the blank-page-showdown like fruit cake at Christmas (pretend it’s not there, so you can’t see its stolid inappropriateness).

The Benefits of an Online Consultation

On a snowy, icy, cold, generally unpleasant day such as today, all you really want to do is stay in. However, your academic life will not accommodate such a break (well-advised  or not!). You know you have a draft due soon, and you feel proud of yourself for starting your research and writing a bit earlier than usual. However, now you have hit the metaphorical wall.

You frantically ask yourself...

Am I done yet?
Did I finish my argument?
How do I finish my paper?
Did I remember to cite my sources properly?
Does my paper even make sense?

You remember the IPFW Writing Center offers appointments, where a helpful writing consultant will work with you to answer your writing related concerns, but that's all the way on campus.

Engaging in Orientations

Writing isn't easy, even for the most seasoned of writers. I think it is probably true that, as for most things, the more you learn about writing, the more you realize how little you know. New semesters always threw me for a loop -- different types of classes, requiring different types of writing, engaging different styles of learning -- but it's a refreshing loop.  New semesters remind us that we are all still learning.

On that note, it has been really nice seeing students/classes come in for orientations. As a Lead Consultant at the Writing Center, I don't always get to see everyone who comes in