Turning Stories from the Writing Center into Useful Knowledge: Writing Centers, WID Programs, and Partnerships for Change

Abstract

Harrington and Dinitz argue that sharing student stories from a writing center through a faculty development program—located in a Writing in the Disciplines/Writing Across the Curriculum program or a Center for Teaching and Learning—can help change the culture of writing on campus. This chapter explores how a faculty development program can use stories from peer writing tutors and writing fellows/mentors to create change in four areas: faculty practices around designing, creating scaffolding for, and responding to writing assignments; how writing is included in the curriculum, both at the foundational and departmental levels; institutional policies related to writing, such as policies for responding to plagiarism; and faculty attitudes and practices in responding to multilingual writers.

Postscript from the Editors

Complex Collaboration—Those involved in the collaborative efforts described here are certainly thinking outside the box, as it were. Working in collaborative pairs, they are change agents, accomplishing more than one individual could achieve alone, and they are gaining competency and collaborative capital as they enact this type of collaboration. This shows us that rich opportunities for collaboration need not be restricted to only educators in academic settings—students can become strong collaborators also, though their stories emphasize how challenging it can be to navigate power structures (whether perceived or actual). The authors remind us that transcending boundaries is not limited to only practicing professionals but can be the outgrowth of students who take an active part in making their stories known and their work visible.

Practical Implications—Dinitz and Harrington offer a novel view of ways in which tutors, students, and teachers from across the disciplines can work together to influence teaching practices and attitudes, along with institutional practices. Firmly grounded in mentoring praxis scholarship and case studies (along with composition, archival, activist, multilingual, and institutional research), this piece goes one step further by illustrating the power of student narratives and the transformative potential in having tutors “telling stories” to faculty teaching WID. In Dinitz and Harrrington’s words, the tutors “become stars” in the role of knowledge givers at faculty workshops. This inventive collaborative mentoring plan goes beyond teacher training to take on an institutional activist role. Furthermore, the program described by Dinitz and Harrington is easily replicable—it depends upon the willingness of participants to collaborate and listen.