|
WPA as Writer:
Writing Program Administration |
English 680W Seminar Professor Shirley Rose |
Syllabus
Assignment
Log Project
Specifications Bibliography
Read:
White "Teaching a Graduate course in Writing Program Administration."
Stygall, "Certifying the Knowledge of WPAs."
Jennie and Tarez present projects
Assignment for Thursday, November 13: Yufeng, Jim, and Jennie lead discussion
on Assessment and Placement
Our readings include (please note the PDF files are about 1MB each):
Huot, Brian. "Toward a New Discourse of Assessment for the College Writing Classroom." College English, 65.2: 163-80. November 2002. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~blankert/huot.pdf
O'Neill,
Peggy and Ellen Schendel, and Brian Huot. "Defining Assessment as
Research: Moving from Obligations to Opportunities." WPA. 26.1/2: 10-26.
Fall/Winter 2002. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~blankert/defining.pdf
Royer and Gilles, “Placement Issues.” (In Enos and Brown)
Slevin,
James F. “Engaging Intellectual Work: The Faculty’s Role in Assessment.”
College English 63.3 (January 2001): 288-304. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~blankert/slevin.pdf
Class meets to work on class project; Professor Rose will
be in Washington, D.C. attending the National Alliance for Writing in the Transition
to college. Specifications for Class Project.
Class period will begin with Jim's presentation of his (adapted)
c.v. analysis project.
To prepare for the exercise workshop, choose two of the course's
daily exercises that you consider good candidates for revision. Be prepared
to discuss your reasons for wanting to revise them, your tentative plans for
revision, and how you plan to use the results of your revision (material for
a conference presentation, study notes for pre-lims, etc.)
Haviland and Stephenson, "Writing Centers, Writing Programs,
and WPAs: Roles by Any Other Names?" (Brown and Enos)
Cooper, David D. and Laura Julier. "Writing the Ties that Bind: Service-Learning in the Writing Classroom." Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning. 2:1, 1995. 72-82. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~aferdina/wpa/cooper_julier.pdf
Deans, Tom. "English Studies and Public Service." Writing Partnerships: Service-Learning in Composition. NCTE, 2000. 1-24. (excerpt) http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~aferdina/wpa/Deans.pdf
Flower, Linda. "Intercultural Inquiry and the Transformation of Service." College English. 65.2 (2002): 181-201. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~aferdina/wpa/Flower1.pdf
Hesse, Douglas. "Understanding Larger Discourses
in Higher Education: Practical Advice for WPAs." Allyn and Bacon Sourcebook
for Writing Program Administrators. Eds. Irene Ward and William Carpenter. New
York: Longman, 2002. 299-314.
Maid, Barry. "More Than a Room of Our Own: Building an Independent Department
of Writing." 453-466.
Merrill, Yvonne, and Thomas P. Miller. "Making Learning Visible: A Rhetorical
Stance on General Education." 203-217.
For an example of Professor Blakesley's writing as a WPA,
Read
Miller, Thomas P. "Why Don't Our Graduate Programs Do a
Better Job of Preparing Students for the Work That We Do?" WPA: Writing
Program Administration 24.3 (Spring 2001): 41-58. (coursepack)
Read
Come prepared to ask questions about Professor Weiser's writing
as a WPA.
This meetings' readings are all from
Rose, Shirley K and Irwin Weiser, eds. The Writing Program Administrator
as Researcher: Inquiry in Action and Reflection. Portsmouth, NJ: Heinemann-Boynton/Cook,
1999 (on reserve at Hicks)
Rose, Shirley K and Irwin Weiser. "WPA Inquiry in Reflection
and Action." (v-xi)
Read (all are on reserve at Hicks)
Gunner, Jeanne. "Ideology, Theory, and the Genre of Writing
Programs." The Writing Program Administrator as Theorist: Making Knowledge
Work. Eds. Shirley K Rose and Irwin Weiser. Portsmouth, NJ: Boynton/Cook-Heinemann,
2002. 7-18
Weiser and Rose offer a
description of WPAs' theorizing that is grounded in the examples provided by
the chapters in their collection; however, the writing WPAs do as part
and product of that theorizing is not a particular focus of their description/definition.
Using these same chapters from the collection, develop a description of WPAs'
writing as theorists.
Read
Bergmann, Linda S. "Academic Discourse and Academic Service: Composition vs. WAC in the University." CEA Critic 58.3 (Spring/Summer 1996): 50-59.
Bergmann, Linda S. "Missionary
Projects and Anthropological Account: Ethics and Conflict in Writing Across
the Curriculum." Foregrounding Ethical Awareness in Composition and
English Studies. Eds. Sheryl I. Fontaine and Susan M. Hunter. Portsmouth,
NH: Boynton/Cook-Heinemann, 1998. 144-159.
Read:
MLA Commission on Professional Service. "Making Faculty
Work Visible: Reinterpreting Professional Service, Teaching, and Research in
the Fields of Language and Literature." Profession 96. New York:
MLA, 1996. 161-216. (coursepack)
*I may not
be able to get the Hult placed on reserve at Hicks in time for you to read it.
If not, please find time to read it as soon as you can, since it can help you
with several of the class projects.
In a brief essay (200-400 words) compare the definitions of "scholarship"
each of these authors or corporate authors assumes or advocates. How do these
defifnitions compare to your own definition of scholarship or the definition
you think is most widely shared in English studies? (If you want to do your
comparison in a form other than a conventional essay, feel free.)
Read:
Brobbel, Amanda et al. "GAT Training in Collaborative Teaching at the University of Arizona." The Writing Program Administrator's Resource: A Guide to Reflective Institutional Practice. Eds. Stuart C. Brown and Theresa Enos. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2002. 411-428
Payne, Darin and Theresa Enos. "TA Education as Dialogic Response: Furthering the Intellectual Work of the Profession through WPA." Preparing College Teachers of Writing: Histories, Theories, Programs, Practices. Eds. Betty P. Pytlik and Sarah Liggett. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. 50-62. (on reserve at Hicks)
Rose, Shirley K and Margaret J. Finders. "Thinking Together: Developing a Reciprocal Reflective Model for Approaches to Preparing College Teachers of Writing." Preparing College Teachers of Writing: Histories, Theories, Programs, Practices. Eds. Betty P. Pytlik and Sarah Liggett. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002 75-85. (on reserve at Hicks)
Hult, Christine and Lynn Meeks. "Preparing College Teachers of Writing to Teach in a Web-Based Classroom: History, Theoretical Base, Web Base, and Current Practices." Preparing College Teachers of Writing: Histories, Theories, Programs, Practices. Eds. Betty P. Pytlik and Sarah Liggett. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002 184-193 (on reserve at Hicks)
Drawing from the accounts of college
writing teacher preparation programs and approaches you've read for the seminar,
identify ways in which the WPA's teaching role and responsibilities differ from
the more conventional classroom teacher's role. In these representations of
WPAs as teachers, what themes recur? What values seem to be shared? Write a
brief (200-400 word) response.
Read:
Larson, Magali Sarfatti. The Rise of Professionalism: A Sociological
Analysis. Berkeley: U of California P, 1977. (selected excerpts in coursepack)
Gere, Anne Ruggles. "The Long Revolution in Composition." Composition
in the Twenty-First Century: Crisis and Change. Ed. Lynn Bloom, Donald Daiker,
and Edward White. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1996. (coursepack)
Miller, Richard E. "From Intellectual Wasteland to Resource-Rich Colony:
Capitalizing on the Role of Writing Instruction in Higher Education." WPA:
Writing Program Administration 24.3 (Spring 2001): 25-40. (coursepack)
Trimbur, John. "Writing Instruction and the Politics of Professionalization."
Composition in the Twenty-First Century: Crisis and Change. Ed. Lynn Bloom,
Donald Daiker, and Edward White. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1996. 133-45.
(coursepack)
Using concepts and professionalization narratives suggested by the selections
from Larson you read for this week, and drawing from the week's readings on
professionalism/professionalization of writing program administration (as well
as other course readings) and any other sources of evidence that seem appropriate,
construct your own narrative of the professionalization of writing program administration.
This can be a narrative of the "profession" as a whole or a narrative
about an individual prototypical/ mythical WPA's "professionalization."
Feel free to dramatize and embellish your narrative and to draw on a variety
of narrative genres-westerns, romances, science fiction, etc.
White, Edward M. "Use It or Lose It: Power and the WPA." Writing
Program Administration 15.1-2 (1991): 3-12. (on reserve at Hicks. Also in
Allyn and Bacon Sourcebook for Writing Program Administrators. Eds. Irene
Ward and William C. Carpenter. New York: Longman, 2002.)
Dickson, Marcia. "Directing Without Power: Adventures in Constructing a
Model of Feminist Writing Program Administration." Writing Ourselves
into the Story: Unheard Voices from Composition Studies. Eds. Sheryl Fontaine
and Susan Hunter. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois UP, 1993. 140-53.
Gunner, Jeanne. "Decentering the WPA." WPA: Writing Program Administration
18 (1994): 8-15. (coursepack)
Phelps, Louise Wetherbee. "Becoming a Warrior: Lessons of the Feminist
Workplace." Feminine Principles and Women's Experience in American Composition
and Rhetoric. Eds. Louise Wetherbee Phelps and Janet Emig. Pittsburgh: U
of Pittsburgh P, 1994.
Bishop, Wendy and Gay Lynn Crossley. "How to Tell a Story of Stopping:
The Complexities of Narrating a WPA's Experience." WPA: Writing Program
Administration 19.3 (Spring 1996): 70-79. (on reserve at Hicks)
Hesse, Doug. The WPA as Father, Husband, Ex." Kitchen Cooks, Plate Twirlers
and Troubadours: Writing Program Administrators Tell Their Stories. Ed.
Diana George. Boynton/Cook Heinemann: Portsmouth, NH, 1999. On reserve at HICKS)
Gunner, Jeanne. "Among the Composition People: The WPA as English Department
Agent." JAC: A Journal of Composition Theory 18.1 (1998): 153-165.
(coursepack).
Develop a visual representation of
one or more of the writing program administrator models suggested by the assigned
readings. This can be a chart, a figure, a photograph, a sketch, a 3-D object,
or any other idea you can come up with. Though your visual should not depend
on it in order to be understood, please include a few paragraphs discussing
your reasons for depicting the model in this way.
Have fun with this.
Also, make some tentative decisions
about course projects you will be doing.
"Administration of the Composition Course: The Report of
the Workshop No. 13." CCC 1.2 (May 1950): 40-42.
"Administration of the Composition Course: the Report of Workshop No. 13."
CCC 2.4 (December 1951): 24-26.
Gracie, William J., Jr. "Directing Freshman English: The Role of Administration
in Freshman English Programs." WPA: Writing Program Administration 5.3
(Spring 1982): 21-24.
Stewart, Donald C. "The Writing Program Director in the English Department
Power Structure." Freshman English News 9.3 (Winter 1981): 17-18
Bishop, Wendy. "Toward a Definition of a Writing Program Administrator:
Expanding Roles and Evolving Responsibilities." Freshman English News (Fall
1987):11-13.
Olson, Gary A. and Joseph M. Moxley. "Directing Freshman Composition: The
Limits of Authority." CCC 40 (1989): 51-59.
In a brief informal essay (250 words), identify and discuss the recurring themes and issues in these representation/idealizations of the WPA across 40 years? Can you identify any evolution in the model of the WPA over the forty years from 1950-1989?
Alternative assignment:
Review the WPA-L archives from September 11, 2001 and write a 250-word comment.
L'Eplattenier, Barbara. "Finding Ourselves in the Past: An Argument for
the Need for Historical Work on WPAs."
Mirtz, Ruth M. "WPAs as Historians: Discovering a First Year Writing Program
by Researching Its Past."
All of the above in The Writing Program Administrator as Researcher: Inquiry
in Action and Reflection. Eds. Shirley K Rose and Irwin Weiser. Portsmouth,
NJ: Heinemann-Boynton/Cook, 1999. (on reserve at Hicks Undergraduate Library)
and
Guba, Egon G. and Yvonna S. Lincoln. "Using Documents, Records, and Unobtrusive
Measures." Ch. 8 in Effective Evaluation: Improving the Usefulness of
Evaluation Results Through Responsive and Naturalistic Approaches. San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass, 1981. (in coursepack available at Copymat by Monday, September
8)
1. What themes recur in the nine narratives of curricular change in FYC presented in this issue of WPA: Writing Program Administration? Make a few notes about your response that can be shared with the class on Thursday.
2. Using these nine accounts of FYC
curricular change as your primary source of data (you may also want to draw
from other FYC curricular changes you are familiar with), sketch out a model
of FYC curriculum development that accounts for the various areas of change
(e.g., goals, texts, assignments, structure), agents of change, reasons for
change, contexts for change, and anything else you think should be accounted
for in the model. Briefly annotate and explain your model in 200-400-words.
Farris, Christine. (Guest Editor): "Introduction: Chaninging the First-Year Writing Curriculum." 7-9.
Reid, E. Shelley. "A Changing for the Better: Curriculum Revision as Reflective Practice in Teaching and Administration." 10-27.
Royer, Diana, Moira Amado Miller, Meredith A. Love, Jennie Dautermann, Mary Jean Corbett, Rhoda Cairns, and Parag K. Budhecha. "Revisiting College composition within a Local 'Culture of Writing'." 28-48.
Himley, Margaret. "Writing Programs and Pedagogies in a Globalized Landscape." 49-66.
Comfort, Juanita Rodgers, Karen Fitts, William B. Lalicker, Chris Teutsch, and Victoria Tischio. "Beyond First-Year Composition: Not Your Grandmother's General Education Composition Program." 67-86.
Each of these articles describes
a change in a local, situated first-year composition program--changes that might
be presumed to be of interest only to the WPAs, faculty, and students at the
particular institutions. What are the authors' strategies for representing these
changes as relevant to the other WPAs who are readers of the journal? Consider,
for example, rhetorical strategies such as organization, language choices, intertextual
references. In a 250-400 word informal essay, briefly describe these strategies
and formulate some speculative "rules" for representing the work of
writing program administration to fellow WPAs.
Be prepared to discuss the English 106 Proposal (handout);
the "Portland Resolution" and the WPA "Intellectual Work Document"
available online at Council
of Writing Program Administrators website