• Director's Greeting
• Hours and Location

What is the Writing Center?

The Writing Center is a place to get feedback on your writing. Peer tutors--students from a wide spectrum of majors on campus--are trained to read your papers and give you solid responses to questions or concerns that you have pertaining to a particular piece of writing.

How does the Writing Center work?

Students should come to the Writing Center with specific questions in mind to ask the tutor: Is my thesis precise and assertive? Does my topic sentence direct and focus the material I put into this paragraph? Are my paragraphs coherent--do they hold together naturally? Does my conclusion bring closure to the rest of the paper? Keep in mind that many students mistakenly think, "If I can just get all the grammar problems corrected at the Writing Center, I'll have a great paper." But writing is more than grammar--much more. Although we can help you with a grammar problem (a surface-level issue), there are other concerns that matter even more, such as whether or not your argument makes sense and is adequately supported (a deep-level issue). Keep in mind, the Writing Center is not a "fix-it shop" where tutors correct all the problems and make the paper perfect. Will the Writing Center really help? The answer to this question depends on whether you are willing to work on your writing over time. Too many students wait until the day or night before a paper is due and then come to the Writing Center expecting a miracle. Under these circumstances, it is virtually impossible to help a student improve. As you already know, writing involves learned behavior from past writing experiences--good habits and bad habits. To truly improve your writing, you have to learn how to become objective and identify characteristic weaknesses that you have acquired in the past. Research shows that the best way to do this is by getting feedback repeatedly before a paper is due. If you get into the habit of bringing a draft of each paper to the Writing Center twice before it is due, your writing will noticeably improve over the course of an academic year. Good writing takes effort.

General tips on writing a paper

The place where most students go wrong is in misunderstanding the assignment and the teacher's expectations of writing in general. So, always spend time carefully reading each writing assignment to understand exactly what the professor expects of you. Also, find out what general requirements the professor has for writing in his or her particular discipline; in other words, a biology lab report is going to be written differently than a philosophy paper. Learn to adapt your writing to different professors and different classes.

Before Writing

• Make sure you understand what is expected of you. If you don't have a clear sense of what you are supposed to do, ask a friend in the class or (even better) the professor for clarification.
• Choose a topic you can become passionate about. Students write better papers when they care about the topic. Find something that you can hate or love, strongly like or dislike.
• Do some kind of invention. E.M. Forster says, "How do I know what I think until I see what I say?" Just write rough ideas out on a page, then transform them into your first draft.

While Writing

• Write your first draft. Without too much concern for grammar or spelling, write your first draft. Don't be a perfectionist! Just generate paragraphs of thought to be revised later.
• Revise your introduction, thesis, and paragraphs. Make sure your introduction captivates your reader. Be sure that the thesis is restricted, unified, and precise. Sharpen all topic sentences.
• Write another draft. Rewrite the paper, keeping an eye out for spelling, punctuation, and grammar. Bring your paper to the Writing Center for feedback (now or even earlier).

After Writing

Proofread your paper, correct any errors, and turn it in. Have someone else proofread your paper, do minor revisions, and then check it over once more before handing it in.

Computers at the Writing Center

The Writing Center has three P133 computers running Microsoft Word 97 available for student use. Remember to bring your own disks!