Re: FW: high school writing centers

[erohan@nslsilus.ORG (Liz Rohan)]

> ----------
>From: Hatton-Montoya, Sharon
>To: 'wcenter'
>Subject: high school writing centers
>Date: Wednesday, April 30, 1997 8:44AM
>
>Hi, I'm fairly new to this list.  Although I've been lurking around for the
>last couple of months, I haven't joined in on any of the threads.  I have
>greatly enjoyed the conversations and have learned much.
>I was wondering if anyone has any experience with writing centers in a high
>school or a middle school setting.  I have been trying to research this
>topic but haven't been very successful.  As a former secondary English
>teacher, I can see the benefits of a writing center tie between a college or
>university and a high school.
>Any shared information would be very much appreciated.
>Sharon Hatton-Montoya
>Writing Center Coordinator
>University of So. Colorado
>hatton@uscolo.edu

Sharon-

I work in a high school writing center at Deerfield High School in
Deerfield, Illinois. ( I tutor and run the computer lab). The center works
much like a college writing center in that students are tutors (along with
teachers, teacher aides and community volunteers). The women who started
the center wrote a book about it, which may give you a framework for
getting the large picture of "how to get started."

I worked in DePaul University's writing center, and learned about writing
center theory when in graduate school. Thus far my experience working in a
high school writing center has been very satisfying because the center
works so closely with the English department and it's small enough so that
I know the texts, the teachers and the assignments. So when tutoring I can
really dig in and get a lot accomplished. The tutoring tends to be more
prescriptive than in college writing centers (crossing over to teaching
mode), but in some instances this ends up being more practical for the
kids.

I can try to gather more specific information about how it works here for
you if you'd like.

Liz

Liz Rohan
Deerfield High School Reading and Writing Center
Deerfield, IL
erohan@nslsilus.org