Our Mission

The UA Writing Center contributes to the UA campus community in three ways: teaching, scholarship, and service.

Teaching: We seek to educate writing students through consultations, provided by appointment or on a walk-in basis. Because no two writers are the same and no two writers work in the same way, we tailor the writing instruction we provide to the specific needs of individual writers.

We provide our consultants with ongoing training so that they may carefully and accurately assess their clients’ needs and suggest specific strategies for planning, drafting, revising, and editing documents. However, Writing Center consultants will not write students’ papers for them, nor will they make guarantees with regard to the grade any writing will receive.

Scholarship: We are party to a rich variety of writing students, each of whom possesses a different level of writing proficiency. We know that we incorporate a rich variety of teaching strategies in our work. Therefore, we are positioned to closely observe and carefully reflect upon writing process and pedagogy, both formally and informally.

We seek to contribute to ongoing research and scholarship on writing center practice and theory; thus, we keep abreast of the latest developments in the field through reading professional publications, maintaining membership in the International Writing Centers Association and the Southeastern Writing Centers Association, attending relevant conferences, and pursuing national certification.

Service: We encourage and support the efforts of faculty from all disciplines to incorporate writing instruction into their teaching. We offer short workshops for writing students on a variety of writing-related issues; hold periodic faculty "brown-bag lunches" to share teaching strategies; and provide consultation time with the Writing Center Director to help faculty plan writing assignments.

As resources allow, we will work to implement and grow programs like the following: satellite tutoring sites; online tutoring services; collaborating with area high schools in areas such as college applications and the National Writing Project; and community literacy outreach.

Philosophy | Mission | Goals