Re: Writing Center tutorials and exams

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

Molly:

> policy.  In my mind, it is the faculty member's responsibility to 
> make the rules of engagement clear to students, not the writing 
> center's responsibility.
Beth says it as clearly as it can be said.  And not only is it the faculty
member's responsibility to make the "rules of engagement" clear to
students, but, if the writing center is to be involved somehow, also to
the director of the writing center.  Not to a tutor, not to the
secretary--to the director.  

I'd think about issuing a disclaimer:  the Writing Center staff will honor
any faculty request for restrictions on assisting students with
out-of-class examinations, provided the request is submitted in writing
prior to the distribution of the examination to students.   In the absence
of such written requests, the writing center staff will provide assistance
as usual. 

> 
> etc--are things we all do all the time I would imagine.  I would be 
> very careful about tying those things in any way to this issue of 
> take-home exams.  This is my own little horse to ride, I know (I have 
> so many of them), but I would want to make it clear that the 
> difficulties instructors have with their pedagogies are _their_ 
> problems, not the writing center's.  Now I am willing to sit down and 
> talk to anyone about teaching issues, but I am not willing to have 
> them lay the problems on the back of the writing center.  They are 
> separate pedagogical issues and these people are conflating them for 
> their own convenience.
> 
It is not a little horse, Beth.  This is very closely related to other
ways that faculty misuse and misunderstand writing center services,
including requesting that writing centers do all the "dirty" work of
"correcting" student problems.  Having a response to such problems that is
consistent with other writing center policies and procedures (and mission
and pedagogical philosophy) is important for sustaining the writing
center's credibility with all members of the institutional community.

Jeanne Simpson
csjhs@eiu.edu