Re: other tutoring

[csjhs@eiu.edu (Jeanne H. Simpson)]

Lynell, Jean and friends,

I am delighted to see this thread developing and so ask that the apologies
and  oops-not-off-list comments be dropped.  The fact that many writing
center personnel with other tutoring obligations of various kinds are on
this list is reason enough to continue.

I am delighted too to read Jean's comments, for I think her philosophy of
training-is-mandatory is dead right.  We are struggling here, in the way
of moving an enormous circus just down the block, to get all our tutoring
programs gathered together and to impose some sort of standard and minimal
training and assessment on them.  If the institution supports this kind of
instruction, informal though it may be, then we have an obligation to make
sure it is not totally haphazard.  

There are, as Jean wisely points out, certain principles that apply to any
kind of tutoring, and we should make an effort to make sure they get
discussed and considered and applied.  Writing centers have, without
perhaps realizing it, exerted real leadership in developing these
principles, in exploring them deeply and insisting on their importance. 
Wherever we have the opportunity to spread the word, even if it doesn't
seem very rewarding, I hope we will.  

Here is another role for NWCA, it seems to me, to articulate these
principles and to articulate the importance to some professional
principles too: that writing center personnel should be compensated for
this expertise and that if it is written into a job description, then the
fact that it is specialized expertise (and it certainly is) should be
acknowledged with appropriate *additional* compensation, above and beyond
writing center directorships.  

Friends, don't undervalue this knowledge.  Make clear that training tutors
is teaching. That it involves the specialized knowledge and research of
reading, conferring with colleagues and all the rest.  We tend to forget
how hard-won this knowledge is and to undervalue it and do it...just
because.  

Jeanne Simpson
csjhs@eiu.edu