The goal of the Roth Writing Center at Connecticut College is to develop not only a student’s writing abilities, but also his or her ability to think critically and make cogent arguments. The Center provides one-to-one peer tutoring to help student writers during all stages of the writing process—from brainstorming topics and creating a thesis to revising a draft. Students are welcome to bring in writing assignments from any class, and the staff can also work with students on senior theses or personal statements for graduate school applications. The Center is staffed by more than two dozen undergraduate writing consultants from a variety of majors who are specially trained to assist students with their writing projects.
To make an appointment with a peer tutor in the Writing Center, click on this Google Calendar.
Writing Across the Curriculum Program
The Center also coordinates the Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) program. See the Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) Guidelines.
FYS Faculty Writing Fellows
FYS Faculty Writing Fellows are drawn from across the disciplines and are assigned to instructors who are teaching a first-year seminar for the first time. The purpose of the Fellows program is to encourage faculty collaboration and the sharing of resources as we help our first-year students to become confident college writers. These collaborations can take many forms. In the past, Fellows have collaborated with faculty members on strategies for designing writing assignments, for sequencing assignments over the course of the semester, for responding to student essays, for structuring peer review of essays, for using class time to work on writing, and so on. Whatever the approach, the goal is to support sustained attention to the teaching of writing over the course of the semester, since this sort of distributed effort has been shown to be highly effective in helping students become stronger writers.
Peer Tutors
Every year, the Director of the Connecticut College Writing Center asks faculty to nominate students to be peer tutors in the Center. Nominees must have not only strong writing skills but also the ability to work well with their peers and to communicate their understanding of writing to others. Every nominee is given an opportunity to interview for the position, and the strongest candidates are offered a spot in Eng 300: Seminar in the Teaching of Writing. This writing-intensive course introduces prospective tutors to pedagogical theory and practice and prepares them to work in the Writing Center upon completion of the course.