And we're back...

Photo by Daniel Schwen. No changes were made to the above image. Accessed through Wikimedia Commons.

I hope your summer is going well so far, faithful readers--if you aren't sitting at the beach, as the above image so tantalizingly depicts, we at least hope the hot months of the year are productive and peaceful for all of you. We at Praxis have officially returned to the office for the summer, and I wanted to post a brief message to keep you up to date on what is happening here at the journal. The silence on the xis blog has also been due to some infrastructural changes and shifting of management. As you learned in our Letter from the Editor in our last issue, I (James) will be taking over as senior managing editor while Thomas Spitzer-Hanks departs to complete his dissertation (good luck, Thomas!) and Casey Sloan becomes the new managing co-editor. While we're sad to see Thomas go, Casey has taken to the work of editing the journal quickly and is already a phenomenal addition to the Praxis team. 

Now for some news: our Fall 2016 issue will be a special guest-edited issue on access and equity in graduate student writing support, with Michele Eodice and Shannon Madden taking the helm. The seeds for this issue began to germinate when I had the pleasure of meeting Michele at IWCA 2015 back in October. One stellar proposal later, and here we are. I’m eager to get this issue in front of you, because how we treat graduate students from all disciplines in writing centers has become an increasingly crucial concern both in our discipline and with respect to the university infrastructure. This couldn’t be a more timely issue (pun not initially intended). If you’re interested in submitting a proposal for a special issue or a guest-edited issue, feel free to contact us any time and we’ll give you the details.  

In addition to our special issue, I’m eager for what the future holds for the Axis blog. Rather than one person managing it with a few guest bloggers here and there, Casey and I will be alternating posts throughout the summer. In addition, we will be featuring weekly articles written by a number of our staff and consultants from the University Writing Center here at UT Austin. As always, we welcome submissions for posts to the Axis blog, and I’d like to take this moment to encourage peer consultants to consider submitting to Axis. Though our main readership and author base have gradually shifted to directors, Praxis was originally envisioned as a way of getting consultants’ voices into the larger scholarly conversations regarding writing centers. The Axis blog is an important way that we can continue to promote and shed light on that view from the ground.

Finally, don't forget to share your data with our Praxis Research Exchange. If you have questions or ideas for PRX, feel free to get in touch with me or Casey at praxisuwc@gmail.com. 

If you can’t tell, I’m excited to climb into the saddle as senior Praxis editor, and I hope you’re all also looking forward to the upcoming academic year. I’ll have more announcements about Praxis’s direction in upcoming installments of the Axis blog, so keep watching for those, as well. Next week, look forward to Casey’s first blog about Axis and audience concerns.

Until next time,
James