Megan's+12+March+Post

After a string of English 110 students coming to the Writing Center, I was beginning to get used to working with the same types of students with very similar assignments. Last week, however, I experienced my busiest hour at a very random time, //and// I got to work with my first business student. He walked into the WC and I had him fill out a client need survey while I finished up with an English 110 student. When I finished up a //fabulous// session with him, I began the session with the business student. His assignment was to analyze the practices of a relatively corrupt business and to write a letter to the CEO outlining these corrupt practices. He wanted to make sure that he kept a consistent tone and was aware of his audience (the company’s CEO) throughout the letter. Since it was a letter, we took it paragraph by paragraph and were able to focus a great deal of our energy on major ideas without having to rush. It was clear from reading each paragraph that this was a group effort: some of the paragraphs were literally flawless, with perfect grammar and the brevity required in business writing. A couple of the paragraphs, however, were not so great, so we spent time eliminating some of the wordiness which helped to strengthen the argument. Throughout, though, the writing kept clear focus and tone throughout, which was the only thing that the writer really wanted to work on. I am assuming that he didn't have time to read the entire letter with all the pieces put in.

This session really couldn’t have come at a more perfect time: for last Wednesday’s class, we read a chapter from the Rafoth book about business and technical writing. From this chapter, I learned characteristics of good writing in the business field, which favors brevity and personable writing (remember, business writers are writing to //people//, not to machines!), along with standard grammar conventions, of course. The chapter really helped me to focus what I did during the session because I knew how business writing was different from the writing that I've done in the broad field of English.

My only question is this: what types of writing have you encountered in the WC, and have there been any instances that you have not felt comfortable with the type of writing?

//Kristin's Response// Hello, Megan! I recently had a session with a student majoring in Biology. I found this session a lot harder to deal with than my other sessions that focused on English papers. The Biology major was about complex issues that flew way over my head. I was very uneasy at the beginning of the session because I was out of my comfort zone. After remembering the science paper guidelines in the Ryan book, I was able to conduct a session that I consider successful. When I was confused, I asked the student to explain the concept behind his writing. When the student explained each paragraph to me, he was able to correct his mistakes and create a clearer paper.

Hi Megan! I also wrote a wiki on this topic! I just recently had a session with a girl who was in the process of finalizing an Economics paper. I know nothing about Economics, nor do my interests lie anywhere in that field. I was dreading having to review her paper, but once we started the session I realized that I was able to help much more than I had anticipated. It always helps when a student is writing an upper-level subject-focused piece to have someone who knows nothing about the subject look over it. By just asking simple questions about what certain terms meant, or which theories I found confusing to grasp, the student was able to answer my questions in Layman's terms. By casually discussing some of these comprehension aspects of her paper, she was able to make a stronger argument for her paper. Often, I've noticed, when students come in with a paper that's on something other than writing, they mainly want help on whether or not what they're trying to say is being eloquently expressed or not. They want to know if their paper makes clear sense. As a Writing Center consultant who knew nothing about Economics, that was all I could do and I think I gave sufficient help. - Emily Mooney