- Provide safe space for collaborative writing processes that allow for variations in background, experience, worldview, and cultural values
- Demystify academic writing and specific expectations of higher education and CGU conventions
- Balance student-driven appointments with a pedagogical approach to tutoring, depending on a student’s individual needs
- Be open to all feedback and critique for improving the appointment process
One of our goals here at the CWR is to demystify academic writing and embrace collaborate approaches to tutoring. To this end, we:
Allow space for all students, from all academic and linguistic backgrounds, to feel comfortable sharing their writing process by allowing them to express feelings of self-doubt, uncertainty, and stress about their work without judgment. It is critical to allow for a variety of backgrounds, experiences, world views, and cultural values when evaluating student work, while still helping to demystify the meaning of assignments and specific expectations from the CGU perspective. These elements include providing solid foundations for common aspects of writing projects, including the format of a critical, thesis-driven approach and the use of specific field conventions. This is done through our own experience as well as by directing students to specific resources such as writing guides, style manuals, and webinars on writing-related topics. To give students the best chance for success, it is important to help them feel certain of what expectations they need to fulfill while allowing space for different forms of expression within those criteria. To develop confidence in their own writing abilities, we will help them discern issues such as: when to follow conventions and when not to, how to make informed choices about their own use of language, meshing their unique approach into larger conversations around a topic, and blending their own approaches with their professors’ expectations for academic writing. In these areas, we are prepared to offer specific strategies and teach specific applications, rather than present abstract concepts that students may not feel confident applying to their own work.
Additionally, we recognize that every single one of us is prone to error. We are open to receiving critique. We also understand our role to hold others accountable for any writing informed by discriminatory ideology. We will do so through welcome and ongoing conversation. We recognize that graduate students have a specific power to influence and affect communities of all sorts, and we understand the power we have in discussing any content that may make others uncomfortable.