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"As student populations in colleges and universities continue to diversify, composition programs do not always meet students' varying needs. English as a Second Language (ESL) students appear to fail mainstream writing courses at higher rates than their traditional counterparts, yet mainstreaming continues to be mandated, often due to budgetary constraints. Many programs offer multicultural writing courses, but these, too, are often ineffective for many students. Meanwhile, as Paul Kei Matsuda shows, there is a decided split between the disciplines of composition and ESL. Since ESL scholars have a much stronger history of working with diverse student populations than composition scholars do, this study aims to look to ESL scholarship, specifically to contrastive rhetoric, to explore more effective methods of teaching writing to students with varying needs. This case study takes an in-depth look at one student's journey writing across cultures. Ming, a Chinese immigrant who has been in the United States for approximately ten years, is a junior at the University of Rhode Island who struggles with writing. Over the course of one semester, three of her projects were studied in depth. Data include transcripts of audiotaped tutorial sessions in the URI Writing Center, Ming's assignments and papers, and the researcher's notes from interviews with Ming following the tutorial sessions. ^ The new contrastive rhetoric (Connor, Kaplan, Purves) insists that external factors such as culture, education, and media influence the rhetorical patterns writers use. Through a lens of contrastive rhetoric, it becomes clear that most of Ming's difficulties when writing stem from a lack of familiarity with the conventions of U.S. academic discourse or of what her reader expects from her text. The source of much of this is cultural. While Ming's experiences are not generalizable, an in-depth look at her experiences foregrounds some of the issues that contrastive rhetoric addresses, making th

discussing how to convince reluctant faculty to adopt a 3-credit-hour training course

discussing how to avoid requiring students to pay tuition to take a tutor training course

This open-access book by Steven J. Corbett, Beyond Dichotomy: Synergizing Writing Center and Classroom Pegagogies, is available to be downloaded free. it is described as follows: How closely can or should writing centers and writing classrooms collaborate? Beyond Dichotomy explores how research on peer tutoring one-to-one and in small groups can inform our work with students in writing centers and other tutoring programs, as well as in writing courses and classrooms. These multi-method (including rhetorical and discourse analyses and ethnographic and case-study) investigations center on several course-based tutoring (CBT) partnerships at two universities. Rather than practice separately in the center or in the classroom, rather than seeing teacher here and tutor there and student over there, CBT asks all participants in the dynamic drama of teaching and learning to consider the many possible means of connecting synergistically. This book offers the "more-is-more" value of designing more peer-to-peer learning situations for developmental and multicultural writers, and a more elaborate view of what happens in these peer-centered learning environments. It offers important implications-especially of directive and nondirective tutoring strategies and methods-for peer-to-peer learning and one-to-one tutoring and conferencing for all teachers and learners of writing.

crowdsourcing a list of possible texts for a course on peer tutoring see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=19344332 see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=24436340

writing centers as MOOC mentors; writing center theory courses offered via MOOCs

crowdsourcing textbooks for a research methods course

a discussion of professional development (non-credit/non-course)

a discussion of text selection for rhet/comp courses

example syllabi available in the message thread see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=1142725 see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=19339339 see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=19083164 see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=24549384

St. Cloud State University has a certification program in Writing Center Administration. Open to writing center administrators with a bachelor's degree. Pairs well with an undergraduate or graduate degree in English or a graduate or doctoral degree in Higher Education Administration. The program is 10 credits. All courses are available online.

discussing disclaimers that cover student responsibility for course work and grading

crowdsourcing materials related to writing in history courses

discussing how to counteract low enrollment and possible class closure see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=19344375

a report from an academic skills center that offers tutoring in developmental reading and writing and English intro courses; article on using the center to train potential English teachers; mailing list

The WAC Clearinghouse, in partnership with the International Network of Writing Across the Curriculum Programs, publishes open-access journals, books, and other resources for teachers who use writing in their courses.

a discussion of whether to offer credits and, if so, how many see also: http://lyris.ttu.edu/read/messages?id=1065120

The WAC Clearinghouse, in partnership with the International Network of Writing Across the Curriculum Programs, publishes open-access journals, books, and other resources for teachers who use writing in their courses.

The U. of Wisconsin-Madison's "Case Scenario/Crtiical Reader Builder is a desktop tool for creating a variety of web-based learning materials. You can combine text, images, video and audio along with embedded quiz questions and scoring to create compelling interactive critical readings, scenarios with decision branching, simulated dialogues, story-like narratives, media rich case studies and much more. The CSCR tool provides a framework for integrating multiple media elements and web resources to make your content come alive with interactivity. Learners can interact with and explore course content, make decisions and receive corrective feedback. For use for Tutors, click the link "Concept Tutor Plus" at the left of the page.