Soliday, Mary. Everyday Genres: Writing Assignments across the Disciplines. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois U P, 2011. Print. CCCC Studies in Writing Rhetoric.
Today, I wrote a letter of affirmation. Before today, I had never even heard of a letter of affirmation. I did some basic research on the genre of the letter of affirmation and gave it my best attempt, but I still don’t know enough about the genre to tell if I wrote a good letter or not. Though it’s been some time since I had the experience of learning a new textual genre, it is a common experience for our students. As they go from course to course, they are often encountering new genres. In this book, Mary Soliday discusses her experience at the City University of New York (CUNY) directing a writing across the curriculum (WAC) program, where she found that helping students understand a genre helped them succeed in writing it, an approach which seems like common sense but is too rarely done in the academy. As a result of her experience, she has developed some insights as to why students often are unable to transfer writing skills out of a general education writing course into courses in their majors.
To help students understand a genre, Soliday argues that instructors should help students understand the social context the genre emerges from, writing, “If the goal is to help students to acquire written forms, then it follows that teachers need to build effective social contexts through which a novice writer becomes familiar with the typical motives that create the conventions usually associated with genres” (xi). The lack of context, Soliday suggests, is a principal reason why students do not write well.
Soliday also suggests that instructors should have common approaches to the teaching of writing, which would help students transfer general principles of rhetoric across different disciplines (xiii). She proposes that a focus on genre as a concept could help to accomplish this goal, provided students are immersed in the types of social situations in which genres operate and aren’t left to figure things out for themselves in an apprenticeship type model (14-15).
Overall, the WAC program at CUNY appears to have been a success with students generally declaring themselves more engaged and that they learned more of the content of the courses through a writing intensive approach (31). Soliday writes, “If teachers can articulate the purpose given to a genre by the social group that awards it meaning in the first place, inexperienced writers will more fully grasp the conventions of the genre because they understand their readers’ expectations” (34). So, one way we could improve student writing at Ursuline perhaps is by focusing on genre and context in a similar manner as CUNY did. Soliday also finds that sequencing assignments, breaking them down into parts, and focusing on idea generation (brainstorming or what rhetoricians would call invention) also played useful roles in improving student learning and writing (77), ideas we could also emulate in just about any course. Soliday’s book is a powerful reminder that the responsibility for improving student writing stretches across the curriculum to every course and every instructor.
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
The Evolution of College English: Literacy Studies from the Puritans to the Postmoderns by Thomas P. Miller
Miller, Thomas P. The Evolution of College English: Literacy Studies from the Puritans to the Postmoderns. Pittsburgh: U of Pittsburgh P, 2011. Print.
In his book When Can You Trust The Experts?: How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education, cognitive psychologist Daniel Willingham notes that “Historians have pointed out that there is a pattern of education theories being tried, found wanting, and then reappearing under a different name a decade or two later” (95). Therefore, some value exists in knowing history, which brings me to The Evolution of College English. Though the book serves as much as an argument for the future of English as a discipline as it does a history of the discipline’s past, it is the past that is most useful for our purposes, from interesting tidbits such as that early creative writing courses were “especially common in women’s colleges” (142) to more germane material such as how writing and writing courses came to be a staple of American higher education (125).
Along those lines (whether handwritten, typed, or word-processed as writing technology progressed), you probably complain about the quality of your students’ writing. You aren’t alone. Just as Miller points out that “professionalism is the unifying ideology of the middle class” (173), complaining about student writing is the unifying lament of educators, who have been doing just that since at least the 19th Century. In fact, it was precisely that complaint that led to the first required composition course in colleges and universities. We don’t have required composition at Ursuline, but our Ursuline Studies courses often have a composition aspect to them. Then, as now, a course focusing on general writing skills can be helpful, but it won’t prepare students for writing in your specific discipline because too many of the written conventions and expectations will be different and specific to your discipline. This misunderstood aspect of writing can make undergraduate education what composition scholar Richard Haswell calls, in his article “Teaching of Writing in Higher Education,” an “instructional minefield” for students (340). As a result, you will still complain about student writing until you realize that it’s your job to teach writing in your discipline. As Miller’s book demonstrates, despite efforts even by English departments themselves to farm out the teaching of writing to others, the literacy expected of college students continues to be a collegewide concern and should be a collegewide endeavor. Complaining about the quality of high schools or freshman college courses will never solve anything because even if those experiences prepared students perfectly for your course, students would still be lacking the literate practices that only you can teach them.
The book is available through OhioLINK.
In his book When Can You Trust The Experts?: How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education, cognitive psychologist Daniel Willingham notes that “Historians have pointed out that there is a pattern of education theories being tried, found wanting, and then reappearing under a different name a decade or two later” (95). Therefore, some value exists in knowing history, which brings me to The Evolution of College English. Though the book serves as much as an argument for the future of English as a discipline as it does a history of the discipline’s past, it is the past that is most useful for our purposes, from interesting tidbits such as that early creative writing courses were “especially common in women’s colleges” (142) to more germane material such as how writing and writing courses came to be a staple of American higher education (125).
Along those lines (whether handwritten, typed, or word-processed as writing technology progressed), you probably complain about the quality of your students’ writing. You aren’t alone. Just as Miller points out that “professionalism is the unifying ideology of the middle class” (173), complaining about student writing is the unifying lament of educators, who have been doing just that since at least the 19th Century. In fact, it was precisely that complaint that led to the first required composition course in colleges and universities. We don’t have required composition at Ursuline, but our Ursuline Studies courses often have a composition aspect to them. Then, as now, a course focusing on general writing skills can be helpful, but it won’t prepare students for writing in your specific discipline because too many of the written conventions and expectations will be different and specific to your discipline. This misunderstood aspect of writing can make undergraduate education what composition scholar Richard Haswell calls, in his article “Teaching of Writing in Higher Education,” an “instructional minefield” for students (340). As a result, you will still complain about student writing until you realize that it’s your job to teach writing in your discipline. As Miller’s book demonstrates, despite efforts even by English departments themselves to farm out the teaching of writing to others, the literacy expected of college students continues to be a collegewide concern and should be a collegewide endeavor. Complaining about the quality of high schools or freshman college courses will never solve anything because even if those experiences prepared students perfectly for your course, students would still be lacking the literate practices that only you can teach them.
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Clueless in Academe: How Schooling Obscures the Life of the Mind by Gerald Graff
Graff, Gerald. Clueless
in Academe: How Schooling Obscures the
Life of the Mind. New Haven: Yale U P, 2003. Print.
Despite Graff’s best efforts, Clueless in Academe still reads like what essentially it is, a collection of his essays from the previous decade, rather than a unified text and coherent book-length argument about how educational institutions, especially colleges and universities, could better develop student potential for argumentation and intellectual inquiry. Nevertheless, the book and its diversity of material provide many useful ideas.
One of Graff’s most important ideas is that students need to see models of the intellectual discourse that they are supposed to produce. He cites the experience of a college English instructor who found that students wrote better essays when they read not only literature but also criticism about that literature (163). Though Graff is careful to note that students cannot just be given any criticism as some will be just too far-removed from their understanding (174), he makes a strong case for providing better models for student writing. It is surprising that this pedagogical approach is so rare. Would a baseball coach make her or his players watch tennis matches and then expect they would be able to be better baseball players as a result? Hey, both sports involve balls and hitting them with modified sticks, right? Yet, such mismatches happen a lot in education. Many instructors have students read stories but want them to write essays, a different type of writing. If, as instructors, we want students to produce a certain genre or type of writing, then we would be wise to show them some models of it first. Otherwise, students are left essentially on their own to create a genre, and, in most cases, they don’t succeed.
To help students along in learning academic genres, Graff proposes another important idea, that of the template, an idea that he developed further with books such as They Say/I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. Basically, to help students make academic arguments, Graff suggests having the students fill out templates such as “Whereas X argues that . . . , I contend that . . .” (169). Otherwise, he notes, “These moves seem disarmingly simple, but they are often hellishly perplexing for inexperienced writers” (168-69). The templates make the necessary moves utterly transparent. Much of academic writing is formulaic; Graff suggests we embrace that aspect, so students can concentrate on content and enter the academic conversation.
And entering a conversation is ultimately what Graff and most instructors want students to be able to do. In fact, Graff’s endorsement of using topics that students are interested in to teach students the conventions and methods of academic inquiry (226) supports the Stage I Ursuline Studies anchors approach to research, in which students pick a personal topic to research. In those courses, the goal is to teach college-level research; the topic doesn't matter so why not let it be something that would engage a student? Then, once students have the skills, those same skills can be employed throughout the curriculum, whether the student has an initial interest in the topic or not.
Other useful bits of the book include a handy explanation to students about how and why to use quotations in academic writing (241-42) and an epilogue that instructs students and teachers in how to write an argument (275-77). Given how Graff bounces around ideawise in the book, he might want to follow some of his own advice. For that reason, I wouldn't suggest reading the book straight through; instead, bounce around yourself, according to your interest. Graff has many good ideas in these essays.
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Despite Graff’s best efforts, Clueless in Academe still reads like what essentially it is, a collection of his essays from the previous decade, rather than a unified text and coherent book-length argument about how educational institutions, especially colleges and universities, could better develop student potential for argumentation and intellectual inquiry. Nevertheless, the book and its diversity of material provide many useful ideas.
One of Graff’s most important ideas is that students need to see models of the intellectual discourse that they are supposed to produce. He cites the experience of a college English instructor who found that students wrote better essays when they read not only literature but also criticism about that literature (163). Though Graff is careful to note that students cannot just be given any criticism as some will be just too far-removed from their understanding (174), he makes a strong case for providing better models for student writing. It is surprising that this pedagogical approach is so rare. Would a baseball coach make her or his players watch tennis matches and then expect they would be able to be better baseball players as a result? Hey, both sports involve balls and hitting them with modified sticks, right? Yet, such mismatches happen a lot in education. Many instructors have students read stories but want them to write essays, a different type of writing. If, as instructors, we want students to produce a certain genre or type of writing, then we would be wise to show them some models of it first. Otherwise, students are left essentially on their own to create a genre, and, in most cases, they don’t succeed.
To help students along in learning academic genres, Graff proposes another important idea, that of the template, an idea that he developed further with books such as They Say/I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. Basically, to help students make academic arguments, Graff suggests having the students fill out templates such as “Whereas X argues that . . . , I contend that . . .” (169). Otherwise, he notes, “These moves seem disarmingly simple, but they are often hellishly perplexing for inexperienced writers” (168-69). The templates make the necessary moves utterly transparent. Much of academic writing is formulaic; Graff suggests we embrace that aspect, so students can concentrate on content and enter the academic conversation.
And entering a conversation is ultimately what Graff and most instructors want students to be able to do. In fact, Graff’s endorsement of using topics that students are interested in to teach students the conventions and methods of academic inquiry (226) supports the Stage I Ursuline Studies anchors approach to research, in which students pick a personal topic to research. In those courses, the goal is to teach college-level research; the topic doesn't matter so why not let it be something that would engage a student? Then, once students have the skills, those same skills can be employed throughout the curriculum, whether the student has an initial interest in the topic or not.
Other useful bits of the book include a handy explanation to students about how and why to use quotations in academic writing (241-42) and an epilogue that instructs students and teachers in how to write an argument (275-77). Given how Graff bounces around ideawise in the book, he might want to follow some of his own advice. For that reason, I wouldn't suggest reading the book straight through; instead, bounce around yourself, according to your interest. Graff has many good ideas in these essays.
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Monday, January 7, 2013
The Shadow Scholar: How I Made A Living Helping College Kids Cheat by Dave Tomar
Tomar, Dave. The Shadow Scholar: How I Made a Living Helping College Kids
Cheat. New York: Bloomsbury, 2012. Print.
Dave Tomar, a former writer for an academic paper mill, has crafted an entertaining, albeit also horrifying, memoir of his days (and nights) cranking out essays for college students. Though Tomar’s story is interesting, the implications of his experience are more noteworthy. According to Tomar, people can make a living helping students cheat through college, which is an indictment of the current state of higher education.
Unlike conventional plagiarism where a student swipes some text from the Internet or whatnot and presents it as her or his own, paid for plagiarism is much more difficult to detect. Indeed, aside from using in-class writing assignments to prevent it entirely, paid for plagiarism may be nearly impossible to detect. But, beyond the question of detection, why are so many students so desperate to pass a college course that they will cheat?
According to Tomar, “For many people of the Millennial generation, there is a rational pragmatism to cheating that did not exist for previous generations” (19). In other words, in a world where the value of an education has essentially been degraded to a certification which provides financial benefit (for example, qualifying for a job), cheating makes a certain sense in a cost-benefit analysis. The likelihood of getting caught is low, and the rewards can be substantial. Since college is viewed anyway as an expensive scam by some students, those students see no ethical problems in spending a bit more to employ someone such as Tomar to ease their passages through college. In their eyes, if one needs to get a clogged sink fixed, one hires a plumber; similarly, if one needs to get an A on a paper, then one hires a professional writer.
In addition to telling his personal story, Tomar comments extensively on the issues within higher education that have led to the flourishing of his former profession. These include the increasingly impersonalization and bureaucracy of many large educational institutions (25), the increasingly higher cost of college (56), Internet entrepreneurs willing to provide a commercial service regardless of the nature of the service (75), the accessibility of knowledge on the Internet (81), the growth of the entitlement mentality among students and their parents (106), the growth in for-profit institutions (123), and so on. We could probably add a few of our own as well that Tomar doesn’t note, but, regardless, his essential point stands: Something’s wrong with the higher education system when this can happen. To illustrate this fact most vividly, Tomar describes writing a doctoral dissertation in five days (177).
Of course, it wasn’t his own.
So what can be done to guard against students cheating in such a manner? Well, first of all, those of us in higher education need to work on the conditions that have allowed this cheating to flourish. In the meantime though, at the level of the individual instructor, it might be wise to develop assignments and assessments which can’t be gamed by bringing in a ringer such as Tomar. For example, in-class writing assignments effectively force students to develop their own intellectual capabilities. Beyond guarding against people such as Tomar, we can also lower the demand for such services in the first place. For instance, breaking large writing assignments down into steps may help students be more confident in their own abilities and less likely to hire a “shadow scholar.” Thankfully, most students probably do do their own work (if only because college is expensive enough as is), but it’s probably good to know that this situation does exist. Tomar is supposedly retired now, but it’s likely another talented writer has taken his place in the paper mill industry. Perhaps you have read her or his work already . . .
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Dave Tomar, a former writer for an academic paper mill, has crafted an entertaining, albeit also horrifying, memoir of his days (and nights) cranking out essays for college students. Though Tomar’s story is interesting, the implications of his experience are more noteworthy. According to Tomar, people can make a living helping students cheat through college, which is an indictment of the current state of higher education.
Unlike conventional plagiarism where a student swipes some text from the Internet or whatnot and presents it as her or his own, paid for plagiarism is much more difficult to detect. Indeed, aside from using in-class writing assignments to prevent it entirely, paid for plagiarism may be nearly impossible to detect. But, beyond the question of detection, why are so many students so desperate to pass a college course that they will cheat?
According to Tomar, “For many people of the Millennial generation, there is a rational pragmatism to cheating that did not exist for previous generations” (19). In other words, in a world where the value of an education has essentially been degraded to a certification which provides financial benefit (for example, qualifying for a job), cheating makes a certain sense in a cost-benefit analysis. The likelihood of getting caught is low, and the rewards can be substantial. Since college is viewed anyway as an expensive scam by some students, those students see no ethical problems in spending a bit more to employ someone such as Tomar to ease their passages through college. In their eyes, if one needs to get a clogged sink fixed, one hires a plumber; similarly, if one needs to get an A on a paper, then one hires a professional writer.
In addition to telling his personal story, Tomar comments extensively on the issues within higher education that have led to the flourishing of his former profession. These include the increasingly impersonalization and bureaucracy of many large educational institutions (25), the increasingly higher cost of college (56), Internet entrepreneurs willing to provide a commercial service regardless of the nature of the service (75), the accessibility of knowledge on the Internet (81), the growth of the entitlement mentality among students and their parents (106), the growth in for-profit institutions (123), and so on. We could probably add a few of our own as well that Tomar doesn’t note, but, regardless, his essential point stands: Something’s wrong with the higher education system when this can happen. To illustrate this fact most vividly, Tomar describes writing a doctoral dissertation in five days (177).
Of course, it wasn’t his own.
So what can be done to guard against students cheating in such a manner? Well, first of all, those of us in higher education need to work on the conditions that have allowed this cheating to flourish. In the meantime though, at the level of the individual instructor, it might be wise to develop assignments and assessments which can’t be gamed by bringing in a ringer such as Tomar. For example, in-class writing assignments effectively force students to develop their own intellectual capabilities. Beyond guarding against people such as Tomar, we can also lower the demand for such services in the first place. For instance, breaking large writing assignments down into steps may help students be more confident in their own abilities and less likely to hire a “shadow scholar.” Thankfully, most students probably do do their own work (if only because college is expensive enough as is), but it’s probably good to know that this situation does exist. Tomar is supposedly retired now, but it’s likely another talented writer has taken his place in the paper mill industry. Perhaps you have read her or his work already . . .
The book is available through OhioLINK.
Friday, December 14, 2012
Vernacular Eloquence: What Speech Can Bring to Writing by Peter Elbow
Elbow, Peter. Vernacular Eloquence: What Speech Can Bring to Writing. New York: Oxford U P, 2012. Print.
A familiar name in Rhetoric and Composition since the 1970s, Peter Elbow appears to intend this lengthy book as his final work. Even if he doesn’t intend it to be his magnum opus, Vernacular Eloquence certainly reads that way, as he seemingly has crammed in every bit of knowledge about writing he has into the book. I doubt many of you will have the patience to get through this entire tome, but, in its many pages, Elbow has some good ideas here worth discussing, so I will point out the specific areas of the book that you might find most useful. His major argument is that speech can be useful for writing in a number of ways, an idea that we certainly can use to help our students. For example, if your students have trouble expressing themselves clearly, ask them to read their writing aloud. Often, the ineffective portions will stand out and be easily corrected. This won’t work in all cases (the Dunning-Kruger effect applies to writing as it applies to nearly everything else), but it will help some students improve their phrasing and syntax, as well as catch some obvious word usage misfires and other mistakes. For that alone, it’s worth doing as part of the writing process. In the book, Elbow explores at length the many benefits of speech for writing, which go far beyond smoothing out phrasing.
Other useful bits of the book include Elbow’s explanation of his own writing process, which might be useful for others to emulate (208); his discussion of the split between grammatical and rhetorical punctuation styles, which might explain why various instructors enforce very different approaches to punctuation and how students get confused as a result (259); his commentary on how the fear of being judged inhibits people’s writing abilities (325), his reference to how using Black English in a writing course can help African-American students succeed in college overall (333); his critique of how certain features of student writing such as insisting that essays “announce their thesis in the first paragraph” aren’t really representative of true academic writing (which is, after all, what we’re supposed to be teaching them—students already know how to write in general, even the ones we consider bad writers, or they couldn’t have made it this far to begin with) (346); his suggestion that policing “proper” grammar has much more to do with social class and gatekeeping than it does with communication and language (354); and his reflection on how freewriting has come to be accepted by the academy over the years (391). Elbow’s book contains a wealth of wisdom, but reading it is a bit like panning for gold. I hope I have pointed out where you are more likely to strike a mother lode.
The book is available in our library.
A familiar name in Rhetoric and Composition since the 1970s, Peter Elbow appears to intend this lengthy book as his final work. Even if he doesn’t intend it to be his magnum opus, Vernacular Eloquence certainly reads that way, as he seemingly has crammed in every bit of knowledge about writing he has into the book. I doubt many of you will have the patience to get through this entire tome, but, in its many pages, Elbow has some good ideas here worth discussing, so I will point out the specific areas of the book that you might find most useful. His major argument is that speech can be useful for writing in a number of ways, an idea that we certainly can use to help our students. For example, if your students have trouble expressing themselves clearly, ask them to read their writing aloud. Often, the ineffective portions will stand out and be easily corrected. This won’t work in all cases (the Dunning-Kruger effect applies to writing as it applies to nearly everything else), but it will help some students improve their phrasing and syntax, as well as catch some obvious word usage misfires and other mistakes. For that alone, it’s worth doing as part of the writing process. In the book, Elbow explores at length the many benefits of speech for writing, which go far beyond smoothing out phrasing.
Other useful bits of the book include Elbow’s explanation of his own writing process, which might be useful for others to emulate (208); his discussion of the split between grammatical and rhetorical punctuation styles, which might explain why various instructors enforce very different approaches to punctuation and how students get confused as a result (259); his commentary on how the fear of being judged inhibits people’s writing abilities (325), his reference to how using Black English in a writing course can help African-American students succeed in college overall (333); his critique of how certain features of student writing such as insisting that essays “announce their thesis in the first paragraph” aren’t really representative of true academic writing (which is, after all, what we’re supposed to be teaching them—students already know how to write in general, even the ones we consider bad writers, or they couldn’t have made it this far to begin with) (346); his suggestion that policing “proper” grammar has much more to do with social class and gatekeeping than it does with communication and language (354); and his reflection on how freewriting has come to be accepted by the academy over the years (391). Elbow’s book contains a wealth of wisdom, but reading it is a bit like panning for gold. I hope I have pointed out where you are more likely to strike a mother lode.
The book is available in our library.
Friday, September 7, 2012
“An Emerging Model for Student Feedback: Electronic Distributed Evaluation” by Beth Brunk-Chavez and Annette Arrigucci
Brunk-Chavez, Beth, and Annette
Arrigucci. “An Emerging Model for
Student Feedback: Electronic Distributed
Evaluation.” Composition Studies 40.1 (2012):
60-77. Print.
A conflict usually exists in the conventional role of instructor. One aspect of teaching is being a coach and guiding a student along her or his studies. Another aspect, however, is being an umpire and evaluating the student’s work impartially. Since the natural tendency of an instructor is to desire for students to do well, coupled typically with a bias to be recognized as a good instructor, instructors may evaluate students’ work less objectively than they should. To combat this tendency and give students’ accurate feedback, which is believed to be more beneficial for students in the long term than giving them false feedback which inflates the sense of their capabilities beyond their actual limits (leading ultimately to frustration and, at times, failure), some colleges have looked into various means of separating out the coach and umpire roles of instruction. One such college is Texas Tech University (TTU), and in “An Emerging Model for Student Feedback: Electronic Distributed Evaluation,” authors Beth Brunk-Chavez and Annette Arrigucci explain how TTU’s redesign of its composition program included a reworking of how student work is assessed in one of their composition courses.
Called “electronic distributed evaluation,” TTU’s composition assessment involves students uploading their writing online where it will be graded by a trained grader who is not their classroom instructor (65). The instructors, following the same core standards as the graders, coach and prepare the students for the evaluation by proving feedback on drafts of their writing (65). Brunk-Chavez and Arrigucci argue that the results have been mainly beneficial, with instruction and grading becoming more cohesive across the entire program. It also appears to have deflated grade inflation with the most common grade in the course now being a B rather than an A. One might think that students might be upset at these changes, but, according to a survey, most students found the new grading fair.
While we do not have the same needs as TTU, which is a large university, instructors at Ursuline could adopt, if possible and desired, a similar approach.
The article is available in the writing instruction resources mini-library in the Ursuline Studies Program office (Mullen 318).
A conflict usually exists in the conventional role of instructor. One aspect of teaching is being a coach and guiding a student along her or his studies. Another aspect, however, is being an umpire and evaluating the student’s work impartially. Since the natural tendency of an instructor is to desire for students to do well, coupled typically with a bias to be recognized as a good instructor, instructors may evaluate students’ work less objectively than they should. To combat this tendency and give students’ accurate feedback, which is believed to be more beneficial for students in the long term than giving them false feedback which inflates the sense of their capabilities beyond their actual limits (leading ultimately to frustration and, at times, failure), some colleges have looked into various means of separating out the coach and umpire roles of instruction. One such college is Texas Tech University (TTU), and in “An Emerging Model for Student Feedback: Electronic Distributed Evaluation,” authors Beth Brunk-Chavez and Annette Arrigucci explain how TTU’s redesign of its composition program included a reworking of how student work is assessed in one of their composition courses.
Called “electronic distributed evaluation,” TTU’s composition assessment involves students uploading their writing online where it will be graded by a trained grader who is not their classroom instructor (65). The instructors, following the same core standards as the graders, coach and prepare the students for the evaluation by proving feedback on drafts of their writing (65). Brunk-Chavez and Arrigucci argue that the results have been mainly beneficial, with instruction and grading becoming more cohesive across the entire program. It also appears to have deflated grade inflation with the most common grade in the course now being a B rather than an A. One might think that students might be upset at these changes, but, according to a survey, most students found the new grading fair.
While we do not have the same needs as TTU, which is a large university, instructors at Ursuline could adopt, if possible and desired, a similar approach.
The article is available in the writing instruction resources mini-library in the Ursuline Studies Program office (Mullen 318).
Friday, August 24, 2012
"Goodbye, Chip" by Eileen Kohut
We interrupt our normal coverage on writing instruction for a bit with a post that reminds us how powerful writing can be and why we value it so much.
Chip Hochstetler claimed with a name like “Charles Hochstetler” he should be called just “Chip.” He had graduated from Carnegie Mellon with a BS in chemistry and worked several years at Lubrizol. He must have realized he needed more people in his life, and after tutoring at Lake Erie and Lakeland, he came to Ursuline College under Director Cindy Russell and tutored chemistry and math. During that time he sat in on a statistics class and began tutoring stats to students, too. Even though stats wasn’t his field, he was always concerned with the students’ needs. His tutoring style was fashioned in individual or group sessions. Many times he ran two reviews the night before a chemistry exam. He came in at night and on weekends; he would meet students during summer school or breaks. Frequently he stayed later if the student required more time. He made up his own appointment sheet and called students himself to schedule them. In later years, he tutored nursing math, and the faculty gave him quizzes to use so that he could design his sessions to meet their individual needs. From 2001-2006, Chip met an average of 750 sessions of math or science each year. Many students wrote him personal notes about his patient help, his clear explanations and his support, especially in chemistry. Often student nurses claimed they wouldn’t have passed without his help. Chip was respected by the faculty in math, chemistry and nursing. He was a guest lecturer each year for the Women in Science and Math Day and performed a lab about the chemistry of soap. He served on the math search committee which hired Michelle Wiggins at Ursuline College.
Outside of academics, Chip worked in security and maintenance and was full time for several years combining tutoring and with other responsibilities. He loved the campus and put bird feeders outside his windows and took home baby turtles. He knew where the fawns were each spring. Always concerned with the grounds, he once was reprimanded because he took a truck with a snow plow (which he could work) and cleaned off the roadway for people coming to a winter basketball game. The basketball team gave him a personalized sweatshirt that he proudly wore when he kept score at basketball games, but basketball wasn’t his favorite sport; volleyball was. While he was at Ursuline College, he helped coach the volleyball team, he built and maintained the sand volleyball court, and played with the varsity team and faculty members. During the season, he participated as a line judge and score keeper. He welcomed the visiting refs and took personal care of them. When a particularly good volleyball player came to Ursuline, he personally funded a scholarship for her for four years totally $6,000. When Chip wasn’t able to tutor last year, he came to several games and supported the teams and hall of fame inductees. During his time at Ursuline, several students invited him to be their “ Faculty” guest at specific games, and Chip was always proud to accompany a student who singled him out as a mentor or teacher. He once told his supervisor that he remembered the teachers who had made a difference for him, too.
While Chip's parents were alive, Chip was devoted to them; his dad died nine years ago and his mom lingered in poor health for several years afterwards. Chip brought in aides and support to keep Mrs. Hochstetler at home. He scheduled a variety of activities during the winter to keep her stimulated and planted flowers everywhere on the homesite. In the past few years, he lost his brother Larry and his mother, and in 2010 took a leave to settle the family estate and prepare the family home in Lyndhurst for sale. He always hoped he could return to Ursuline, and his belongings at the college include a signed volleyball from a winning game, pictures of several basketball teams and posters of Chip at games and team schedules. Tucked inside his papers and chemistry quizzes are notes and thank you cards from many students who were articulate in their gratitude to him for the help he gave. One note in particular said, “it seems I am always thanking you for something.” Chip spent his life and talent taking care of others.
Eileen D. Kohut is the Director of Ursuline Resources for Success in Academics (URSA) at Ursuline College.
Chip Hochstetler claimed with a name like “Charles Hochstetler” he should be called just “Chip.” He had graduated from Carnegie Mellon with a BS in chemistry and worked several years at Lubrizol. He must have realized he needed more people in his life, and after tutoring at Lake Erie and Lakeland, he came to Ursuline College under Director Cindy Russell and tutored chemistry and math. During that time he sat in on a statistics class and began tutoring stats to students, too. Even though stats wasn’t his field, he was always concerned with the students’ needs. His tutoring style was fashioned in individual or group sessions. Many times he ran two reviews the night before a chemistry exam. He came in at night and on weekends; he would meet students during summer school or breaks. Frequently he stayed later if the student required more time. He made up his own appointment sheet and called students himself to schedule them. In later years, he tutored nursing math, and the faculty gave him quizzes to use so that he could design his sessions to meet their individual needs. From 2001-2006, Chip met an average of 750 sessions of math or science each year. Many students wrote him personal notes about his patient help, his clear explanations and his support, especially in chemistry. Often student nurses claimed they wouldn’t have passed without his help. Chip was respected by the faculty in math, chemistry and nursing. He was a guest lecturer each year for the Women in Science and Math Day and performed a lab about the chemistry of soap. He served on the math search committee which hired Michelle Wiggins at Ursuline College.
Outside of academics, Chip worked in security and maintenance and was full time for several years combining tutoring and with other responsibilities. He loved the campus and put bird feeders outside his windows and took home baby turtles. He knew where the fawns were each spring. Always concerned with the grounds, he once was reprimanded because he took a truck with a snow plow (which he could work) and cleaned off the roadway for people coming to a winter basketball game. The basketball team gave him a personalized sweatshirt that he proudly wore when he kept score at basketball games, but basketball wasn’t his favorite sport; volleyball was. While he was at Ursuline College, he helped coach the volleyball team, he built and maintained the sand volleyball court, and played with the varsity team and faculty members. During the season, he participated as a line judge and score keeper. He welcomed the visiting refs and took personal care of them. When a particularly good volleyball player came to Ursuline, he personally funded a scholarship for her for four years totally $6,000. When Chip wasn’t able to tutor last year, he came to several games and supported the teams and hall of fame inductees. During his time at Ursuline, several students invited him to be their “ Faculty” guest at specific games, and Chip was always proud to accompany a student who singled him out as a mentor or teacher. He once told his supervisor that he remembered the teachers who had made a difference for him, too.
While Chip's parents were alive, Chip was devoted to them; his dad died nine years ago and his mom lingered in poor health for several years afterwards. Chip brought in aides and support to keep Mrs. Hochstetler at home. He scheduled a variety of activities during the winter to keep her stimulated and planted flowers everywhere on the homesite. In the past few years, he lost his brother Larry and his mother, and in 2010 took a leave to settle the family estate and prepare the family home in Lyndhurst for sale. He always hoped he could return to Ursuline, and his belongings at the college include a signed volleyball from a winning game, pictures of several basketball teams and posters of Chip at games and team schedules. Tucked inside his papers and chemistry quizzes are notes and thank you cards from many students who were articulate in their gratitude to him for the help he gave. One note in particular said, “it seems I am always thanking you for something.” Chip spent his life and talent taking care of others.
Eileen D. Kohut is the Director of Ursuline Resources for Success in Academics (URSA) at Ursuline College.
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