As an academic unit, the Sweetland Writing Center is committed to developing a strong research component. We aim to critically examine all aspects of Writing Center and writing program work, as well as make sound, data-driven decisions in areas such as course restructuring, course offerings, and student placement practices.

From Peer Tutors to Writing Center Colleagues: The Potential of Writing Center Internships

Assessment of Tutoring Best Practices in the Sweetland Writing Center

In Fall 2007, with support from the Gilbert Whitaker Fund for the Improvement of Teaching, a team of four researchers from Sweetland and the English Language Institute undertook a study of the Writing Workshop. In April 2008, the team traveled to New Orleans to present their preliminary findings at the Conference on College Composition and Communication. Research on Sweetland's Writing Workshop continues in an effort to further refine our tutoring practices.

The First-Year Writers Project and Directed Self-Placement Evaluation

The SWC Data Group is investigating the writing experiences of first-year students. They collected and analyzed data from across the University in order to improve the Directed Self-Placement evaluation, and thus help new students better choose a first year writing course.

The Impact of Meta-Cognitive Strategies within Writing in the Disciplines

Together, the Sweetland Writing Center and the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT) are using an experimental model to investigate strategies for improving student learning of critical thinking and writing in upper-level writing courses. This joint effort is supported by a three-year grant awarded by the Teagle and Spencer foundations. This grant is one of thirteen awarded nationally for projects on the Systemic Improvement of Learning in Research Universities.

New Media Writing

In today's media-saturated culture, print text is only one form of "writing." Accordingly, Sweetland has conducted University-wide surveys to create courses that will best prepare students to incorporate a variety of new media into their writing in rhetorically effective ways.

Redefining Advanced Writing in the Disciplines

In Fall 2001, the Sweetland Writing Center received a grant from the Gilbert Whitaker Fund for the Improvement of Teaching to begin evaluating and reconfiguring the Upper-Level Writing Requirement, then called the Advanced Writing in the Disciplines Program. Through an intense study of the role of advanced writing in the Political Science Department, Sweetland restructured the methods for Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) training in Upper-Level Writing courses and made changes in the teach of advanced writing throughout the University.