Patrick Johnson and Lisa Johnson-Shull
PULLMAN Four members of the WSU Writing Program shared information on program efficiency, e-tutoring and student accountability at the 2009 national Council of Writing Program Administrators (WPA) conference July 16-19 in Minneapolis, Minn.
A presentation by staff member Patrick Johnson detailing the online tutoring service available to WSU students won the award for best poster.
“Writing Program Abundance in a Climate of Higher Education Scarcity (Or How to Run an Award-Winning Writing Program on $1,500 a Day)” was the topic of a roundtable session facilitated by Diane Kelly-Riley and Lisa Johnson-Shull, writing program co-directors. Johnson-Shull discussed flexibility, personnel competence and the importance of a clear and focused programmatic philosophy. Kelly-Riley discussed the importance of aggregating and documenting data that a writing program can use for scholarship and research as well as to respond to accountability mandates from the larger institution.
Kelly-Riley leads the Writing Assessment office of the program which handles new student writing evaluations as well as the junior-level Writing Portfolio requirement for all students. Johnson-Shull directs the Writing Center which provides on average 10,000 peer tutoring contacts to WSU students each academic year.
Writing Center Coordinators Anne Ritter and Johnson also presented at the conference.
Ritter participated in the Innovative Practices in Group Work: Support Student Success session. She discussed, “Melding Programmatic and Student Accountability in Writing Center Small Group Tutorials.” This focuses on ongoing research into the effectiveness of WSU’s small group writing tutorials which has demonstrated that students in them are able to effectively learn a framework to respond to each others’ writing. Likewise, the researchers found that they could get the same results with small group tutorials comprised of students from the same first-year composition course or with students from a variety of first-year composition courses.
Johnson’s posters detailed, “Washington State University Writing Program’s Evolutionary Step: The Move from Homegrown OWL to the Northwest eTutoring.org Consortium.” WSU students have been able to access online tutors in several subjects since January 2008; WSU and several other institutions in the Northwest provide tutors for the program. The consortium service replaced the Online Writing Lab (OWL), which had been in place since 1995.
Voted “best poster presentation” by attendees, Johnson’s poster session provided an opportunity for Midwest schools to observe and explore WSU’s involvement in e-tutoring, he says.
The WPA is a national association of college and university faculty with professional responsibilities for, or interests in, directing writing programs.
The WSU Writing Program assists thousands of students, faculty, and staff with writing needs each year through its Writing Assessment office, the Writing Center, and the Writing in the Disciplines program. The Writing Program and its staff are the recipients of numerous national awards, recognitions, and grants. For several years, it was recognized as a top program by U.S. News & World Report in its “America’s Best Colleges” annual issues. The Writing Program is a unit in the Office of Undergraduate Education.
