Non-Trads & Ethics

Gardner, E. et. al. "Writing Center Ethics & Non-traditional Students." Writing Lab Newsletter 26.6 (Feb. 2002

As I read this article a lot of different thoughts crossed my mind. 1) (Even though I am not an official writing consultant) I have had moments when people have asked me to proof-read their papers and I may have committed and unethical act by assuming something about them or their paper before actually reading it. 2) Will I ever encounter a “typical” “non-traditional” student in the writing center and will I be prepared having read this article. 3) Will I ever be in the “non-traditional” student’s position later on in life and if so will I be treated this way? Other random thoughts crossed my mind as well but these were the most salient. One of the biggest points however, was the consultant’s feelings regarding older students. The consultant admitted, “With older students I worry about whether they will see me as too “unprofessional,” or another time when the consultant compared advising an older tutee to “reminding [their] grandmother to wear her coat and hat before she goes outside.” How does a consultant handle these situations professional without feeling compromised as to whether or not they are treating each student equally? In some cases the very nature of our upbringing or teachings regarding authority play some role in how we will interact with different students especially the “non-traditional” and even more so when they remind us of an authority figure in our life (a mother, father, aunt, etc).

Shadowing

This shadow session was by far one of the most entertaining experiences. Once again I was shadowing in study hall so it was another athlete whom I knew. She had a 5-6 reflection paper concerning a book she had to read. This assignment was for her feminist course with six other students. She had to read a book and then present it to the class (she did not specify but I assume the other students had to do it as well). She had already finished the paper so her meeting with the consultant was heavily focused on editing and revising. The majority of her problems were grammatical, occasionally using the wrong verb tense. About 3/4ths of the way through the consultation she revealed (after numerous added commas and semicolons) that it was more of a speech rather than a reflection paper. Hence, she did not have to submit it to her teacher; she only had to read it aloud. Upon hearing this the consultant looked confused and then proceeded to ask, through laughs, why she had seen her for help if it did not have to be turned into the teacher. The writer replied that she wanted to make sure that it sounded well since she had to read it aloud to her class. After that since the session was basically over we shared some laughs over what occurred.

Overall the paper was well written and had it been turned it for a grade I am more than positive that the writer would have received at least a B.

My first shadowing experience

My first shadowing experience!! For starters the consultant that I am shadowing is a teammate of mine so we already have a good relationship. She actually encouraged me to pursue the writing consultant position so we have conversed about papers, the position, and other things entailed in being a consultant. Since I am shadowing in study hall, all the writers are athletes so I see more than a few familiar faces. The appointment my consultant had was actually my teammate so it made it easier to shadow without having the awkward silences and looks and moments that normally come with first time meetings. The prompt the writer was given was a little ambiguous and very lengthy. It was for a leadership class and the students had to formulate a question discussing leadership and how it related to the ideas of society and the individual. Throughout their paper they had to integrate articles from class to develop a theoretical answer to the question. Overall the prompt was fairly long and pretty complex when you read it. It took about 15 min just to decipher what exactly the assignment. The nice part about it though was that the writer had yet to begin her paper so she was still in the beginning stages of developing concepts and ideas. With an assignment this complex I feel as if she had already started and been at any other stage of the writing process then there would have been a mess of problems. She might have been attached to certain ideas and editing and changing them would have created more problems. We spent a little bit of time deciding the format of the paper because organization was the key to fluidity with this topic. She finally decided to begin with her question, include the articles and then use the evidence from the articles to answer the question. For the most part she had a pretty good idea on how she was going to write her paper. The only problem encountered was formulating the thesis. There were so many criterions to cover that the writer had no idea how to fit it all into one sentence. Once this happened the consultant told her that she could actually put her thesis in more than one sentence. I had never before heard this so I questioned the consultant. She told me that it was mostly a high school thing and that if necessary you could actually have a thesis in more than one sentence. I was pretty amazed by this (and I am still a little skeptical) but hey she could be right. After that we were pretty much finished with the session. I offered the writer a few tidbits of information about different strategies and techniques that work for me, and the consultant and I both showed her the writer’s web in case she needed further help afterwards. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed my time shadowing and I cannot wait to see the finished project or what grade she receives.