Praxis: A Writing Center Journal • Vol. 20, No. 2 (2023)

From the Editors: Influences in the Writing Center: From Micro to Macro

Kiara Walker
The University of Texas at Austin
praxisuwc@gmail.com

Kaitlin Passafiume
The University of Texas at Austin
praxisuwc@gmail.com

In Praxis issues of the recent past, we (Kiara and Kaitlin) have aimed to shine a light on the many ways that writing center work resounds throughout university life, in and beyond the walls of the center. We have recognized how the writing center guides students towards success, enjoining the wider educational system to follow our lead on many pressing issues like inclusion. We have celebrated the transformative nature of writing center work, uncovering how our practices help not only writers to transform, but how writing center administrators and faculty alike can evolve through the work that we do.

In this issue, we celebrate the micro-influences that writing center work produces, even as our practices reach outside of the buildings that house us. The authors included in this edition echo this sentiment, as evidenced by their varied qualitative and quantitative studies. There is one thing each author communicates invariably, despite the plethora of themes and formats you will find herein. These practitioners express the influential nature of writing center work, beginning with the microcosmic element of the sentence itself. This fragment of a writer’s work begins its journey on paper, reverberating on each new level until our purpose is felt outside of the wider educational institution. Closing the issue, writing center pedagogy informs prison curricula as a true testament to the resounding impact of writing center work.

In her column “The Art and Craft of Sentence-Level Choices,” Michelle Cohen kicks off the current issue as she blurs the line between art and craft. The author advocates for the micro, exposing LOCs (lower-order concerns) as that methodology which can make artists out of writers. Cohen’s metaphor comparing sentence construction to ceramics does the work of placing sentence craft squarely in the artistic realm, illustrating “the inherent relationship between form and content.”

Next, Diana Awad Scrocco widens the lens in her focus article “What’s Your Plan for the Consultation? Examining Alignment Between Tutorial Plans and Consultations Among Writing Tutors Using the Read/Plan-Ahead Tutoring Method.” In this case study, Scrocco exposes a tension between consultation agenda setting and use of the read/plan-ahead method, used primarily when tutors encounter advanced writing or unfamiliar topics. She examines the benefits and drawbacks of each consultation priority, looking at thirteen separate consultation moments where each method can be found at work. The author gives due consideration to both the agenda-setting and read/plan-ahead strategies, ultimately reminding us that writers should unwaveringly be the center of every consultation choice that a tutor makes.

In “Faculty Writing Groups for Writing Center Professionals: Rethinking Scholarly Productivity,” the authors take their experiences as writing center professionals into a writing group. Through this group, authors Kara Poe Alexander, Erin M. Andersen, Julia Bleakney, and Jennifer Smith Daniel come to better understand their own approaches and possibilities when considering scholarly work. The authors’ insights in three areas of productivity—scholarly and intellectual, professionalization and mentoring, and social support—are of use for other writing center professionals making the case about the value of their work that may not fit into common notions of scholarly productivity.

Kelle Alden follows in “A Model for Infusing a Creative Writing Classroom with Writing Center Pedagogy,” empowering the very methodology that fuels our centers to inspire greater scholarly collaborations. The author applies writing center theory using statistical data in an unaffiliated writing class, showing one example of how our discoveries can benefit the institution beyond the wring center itself.

Bhattarai et al follow, backing farther away from the center’s walls as they present “Reading the Online Writing Center: The Affordances and Constraints of WCOnline.” This focus on virtual practice is timely, considering an educational shift to incorporate technology and answer demands for multidimensional curriculum. Pratistha Bhattarai, Aaron Colton, Eun-hae Kim, Amber Manning, Eliana Schonberg, and Xuanyu Zhou highlight the ways in which pandemic trauma forced educators to catch up to the demands of a digital society. In much the same way that pen-and-paper academia values a book review, these authors offer “critical digital pedagogy,” creating a guideline for the oft discussed WCOnline. This collective employs an analytical approach to the platform’s benefits and shortcomings, ultimately suggesting best practices to maximize this online tool’s usefulness for writing center work.

Next in “What Our Tutors Know: The Advantages of Small Campus Tutoring Centers,” Ana Wetzl, Mahli Mechenbier, and Pam Lieske take us to a set of regional campuses in Ohio, arguing for the value of writing centers in these spaces in response to rise of eTutoring. By surveying tutors at the featured regional campuses, the authors gain insight into the communities of practice developed there and the possibilities of on-campus tutoring that are not likely to be reproduced in eTutoring spaces and practices. Based on their survey, the authors advocate for preserving and maintaining writing centers on regional campuses, arguing for the benefits that can be had in communities of practice present in local, face-to-face interactions.

Julie Wilson closes our issue by looking at writing center collaborative work in an often-disregarded space for intellectual and educational experiences. In “Advocates for Education in Prison-Based Writing Centers,” Wilson presents her findings from developing a writing studio in a women’s prison. By using a qualitative action research design, Wilson was able to design and redesign a supportive writing center that took into consideration student experience and the knowledge of system impacted scholars. Based on the study, Wilson encourages writing center practitioners to genuinely seek out, center, and respond to student advocacy and students’ ability to recognize their own needs.

In the spirit of employing our work outside the writing center and ushering in new practices and policies, it is with excitement for the future that we bid goodbye to our co-editor Kaitlin Passafiume, as she transitions into a new role. In this next phase, she will undoubtedly rely on what writing center practice has taught her even as she works to promote decolonizing versions of democracy in Latin America. She signs off this chapter, humbled by the potency of writing theory and policy to transcend sentence creation, the walls of our centers, our educational institutions, and our nations’ boundaries, leaving us with the following message:

“The past two years have served to etch the value of writing center work beyond merely helping writers help themselves. The University Writing Center at UT and our premier journal Praxis have given me a greater purpose in academia, and the diverse roles I have been able to play have afforded me a complexity that shall shape my future career path. Each author and collaborator have taught me new applications for our work, and I am forever grateful for your continued contributions, even as we continue to tap away and toss new thoughts into the writing arena.”