Transcript of Podcast #33: Center for Excellence in Writing & Communication
In Attendance: Aimee Jiang (she/her) & Evin Groundwater (he/him)
Aimee: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the GIC podcast. My name is Aimee Jiang and I am the International Students of Support Officer for Graduate Division. Very excited to have another campus resource join us. I know this is a series that we’ve had just to make sure that you all feel comfortable and knowledgeable about the resources that we have on campus. There are so many of them and so many benefits that you can get. So today we have the Center for Excellence in Writing and Communication joining us. And I will pass it over to my co-host to introduce himself.
Evin: Thank you so much, Aimee. I am Evin Groundwater. I am the director of, as you noted, the Center for Excellence in Writing and Communication. But most folks just call us the Writing Center. And that’s just fine, too.
Aimee: Yes, we have all these long names on campus and we use a lot of acronyms.
Evin: Yes.
Aimee: As well and it gets really confusing. So short form Writing Center. And that’s really what you’re here for is help with writing. And so can you tell us a little bit about your office and what kind of services that you provide in particular for graduate students?
Evin: Absolutely. So we view writing as a social activity. You know, it doesn’t matter how good of a writer you are, to make sure that you are communicating and kind of getting across exactly what you want to. You need to talk to somebody about that and get some feedback, ideally, and hopefully from somebody who’s good at giving that feedback. And also, you know, helps you with not being too mean as they give that feedback. So that’s why we’re here. We provide that expert audience for both graduate students and undergrads. We do that through consultations with our graduate writing consultants, we have three of them on staff usually during the year and at least two in the summer. And we also provide a host of other services. So those are one on one hour long appointments where you talk with a grad writing consultant, you can, you know, bring any kind of writing you’re working on or even if it’s something that’s more in the realm of like ideas or communication related things like a presentation or you might be working on your qualifying exams and want to just kind of run through, you know, how you might respond to some questions. That’s okay too. We also have a few other services that we provide are big ones outside of the appointments, are programing around just giving people a space to write and giving them some encouragement and community to write in. So we do writing groups. Each of the grad writing consultants has a writing group. I am also running a writing group this quarter focused on the job market and job market materials. So anyone who’s interested in that, definitely check it out. And then we usually do about three or four times a quarter what we’re calling writing bootcamps, and we’ve split those up. So we have AM sessions for those and PM sessions kind of across the quarter at four different periods.
Aimee: Yeah, I think when I was a grad student I was like, I used my Writing Center on my campus a lot as an undergrad. I felt like I didn’t always maybe know where to start. I needed help with brainstorming. Grammar. Grammarly is obviously really helpful for that and can cut down on really needing to use appointments in those spaces. But it was always helpful to have someone kind of checking my writing. And then when I got to grad school I just felt maybe kind of overly confident that I didn’t really need to use the Writing Center anymore. And I did. And so I think a lot of grad students kind of feel that way. I know what I’m doing. I know how to write a paper. But you kind of alluded to this like, it is really helpful to have someone just kind of looking it over for maybe the way that I speak isn’t coming across as naturally in my writing. So amongst that, like why are some, what are some like important things that grad students get out of coming in for, like an appointment or maybe out of a boot camp, you know, connection with others but also, yeah, in terms of their writing, what are some ways that they can benefit from using your services?
Evin: Absolutely. So yeah, a lot of folks, pretty much all really folks who get into grad programs usually do so because they’re already effective writing, you know, effective writers and communicators. So there are a number of things still, even if you are already pretty effective at that, that we think are really helpful coming in for. Probably one of the biggest in a lot of people don’t think about this but graduate programs particularly when you, if you’re in a Ph.D. program and when you get to the dissertation stage, they can be extremely isolating. It can be really hard to feel like you’re, you know, part of a very common experience in writing these things and maybe not always feeling so good about them or not being sure if your ideas are good or sometimes getting feedback that feels really harsh or, you know, just doesn’t make us feel very good about the work that we’re doing. And one of the things that you can do and one of the reasons I think it’s great to visit the Writing Center is to talk with the other grad writing consultants, to communicate with grad students who are often going through the exact same things that you’re going through. Those feelings of isolation, those feelings of imposter syndrome that creep in or even just occasionally, you know, being frustrated with committee member feedback or advisor feedback. You know, we don’t pass along any kind of, you know, feelings that you might share in those sessions to those folks. And we’re a good neutral third party to come just fight some of those feelings. So that’s often something folks don’t think about immediately when they think about why they might want to visit the Writing Center as a graduate student. There are a lot of other reasons, too. Sometimes, even if folks come into grad school feeling really confident about their writing, that confidence can erode, particularly when you have to weather a lot of rejections, a lot of potentially vague or harsh, or difficult feedback that you might get from committee members, advisors, even sometimes colleagues. And so when that confidence starts to kind of erode or get worn down, it’s always nice to just bring the writing to someone and kind of get that second pair of eyes and they can tell you, yeah, you know, you’re doing a really good job communicating this element, but maybe you could say a bit more here, or I’m not quite following this on this level. So confidence is another level. And then probably the next biggest thing I’d encourage folks to come for, in addition to all the usual things you think about in terms of writing feedback, you know, we’ll help you make sure things are organized well, that you’re communicating the argument well. But some of that is just talking through your ideas, especially if you’re working on, you know, a master’s thesis or taking some qualifying exams or working on a dissertation. There’s a lot of work that goes into that, that we don’t always credit as work and is often really difficult to do alone. A lot of that is just kind of talking through or thinking through your ideas and really just exploring them, figuring out what you want to say so that when you go to put it down on a page, you have a much better sense of that. And that’s another thing I always recommend. Sometimes folks feel like they can’t or shouldn’t bring something to the Writing Center if they don’t have something to literally bring in and show us. And that’s not true. A big part of writing is just thinking and trying to get it all kind of out there, in your head so you can put it out on the page. And that’s another really good reason that we recommend folks come to the Writing Center.
Aimee: Yeah, we talk about this at the career center, like attending a career fair. It’s never too early to attend a career fair so same for you then. It’s never too early to bring in any level of your writing. Maybe you have nothing. Maybe you have a syllabus that tells you this is what you are supposed to be writing about for this course. Maybe you have one sentence or you have kind of an outline, or maybe you have a full thing that you just need some additional help with or someone to help you organize and review. And so in some of these, especially maybe some of the programs that you offer, if you wanted to attend, like a writing boot camp, do you need to have something ready for those or are they similar to an appointment where you can just kind of show up with nothing and be in community with others who are also struggling?
Evin: Yeah, that’s absolutely right. It doesn’t matter whether you’ve got something already fleshed out, full project ready to go, you just need to polish it or whatever. Or if you’re just trying to figure out what it is you’re doing or what you’re saying. We, I mean, we do a check in at the beginning just to kind of help set goals, introduce ourselves to everybody. But, you know, we never kick somebody out if they’re like, I brought in, you know, some grading I need to do, or I’m just kind of crunching some data and don’t even know if I’ll get to writing. A lot of what we’re doing is just trying to build community and give people a space to be accountable. That’s one of the hard parts of grad school in that transition from undergrad to grad, especially if folks don’t have a more structured program or people they can rely on to help them kind of set deadlines and goals and help them be accountable is, if it’s just you, if you’re the only person who’s in charge of making sure things get done, sometimes it’s really easy for, you know, things just kind of keep going or for deadlines to keep extending. And so using writing groups or bootcamps or even making appointments as a way to just build in a bit of accountability for yourself, come make sure you’re doing something. Because we know if you come, you sit down, you’re in a space where everybody’s at least trying to make some progress on whatever they’re working on. You’re much more likely to actually make that progress. And once you get a little bit of progress, it’s a lot easier to kind of keep it rolling. It kind of snowballs like that usually.
Aimee: Yeah, I think a lot of my students have talked about doing like a workshop or a boot camp when they’re stuck. And sometimes they feel like, well, we know we’re excited. We got some maybe some good data or we’re, you know, progressing in our degree to a point where we’re really excited and we get some stuff on the page and then we just, your brain just stops. You just like can’t think anymore. And it is really nice to have that community to be like, Well, I got three sentences out and a week ago and I haven’t gotten anything out since then because I just don’t know where to go and to have other people say, yeah, I’ve been there. This is what I did. Here’s some techniques that I used. Let’s talk through it maybe, and see if we can get that ball rolling for you. And and that snowball just gets bigger and bigger once you kind of get going. So I think I’ve heard great things about some of those workshops from my students. So highly encourage people to check them out and utilize them. Individual appointments I think are some of the most popular things that I hear from students because again, like you mentioned, it is kind of isolating. So I think sometimes going into a big group, students are a little maybe self-conscious about their writing. So getting an individual appointment could be a really good starting space in using your services. But what does it look like to make a first appointment? Are these appointments offered in person o are they virtual? Can you do kind of either or? What does that process look like?
Evin: Yeah, so we try really hard to make our services as accessible as we possibly can as much as we can. That means making a schedule that’s oh sorry, making an appointment on our schedule is as easy as going to our website with a button that says, How do I schedule an appointment? When you make that first appointment, you know, it’s always nice to just give our grad writing consultants a head up that it’s your first time at the Writing Center. Usually they ask, and sometimes we can even see that within the system. But they’ll ask you a bit about you know, what it is you want to work on and maybe how you learn, maybe how writing usually goes for you and things you want to let us know upfront. And they’ll also walk you through what we usually do in an actual session. A lot of folks kind of come in with the expectation that we’ll be kind of an in-person version of like Grammarly, or we’ll just kind of walk through grammar and proofreading. And we can do that, especially when folks are at very late stages or they’re trying to get something out for publication and they just want to make sure they’ve had that kind of final set of feedback and everything’s kind of spic and span and all the grammar is correct and everything. We will do that. But we also do a whole lot of other things along the way, and we’ll kind of encourage you to think about the different ways that you can use us for things like, you know, just coming in to pitch ideas or expand on something. We might talk with you about, you know, we don’t know, for example, you know, the science or the data behind what you’re working on. But we can tell usually when maybe like your transitions aren’t as strong or is a reader I can’t follow. One of the things we often hear back when people make their first appointment or two and that they didn’t expect was just coming and having to explain what your project or what you’re writing about is to someone who’s not in the field, who’s not an expert, who may not know anything at all about your research or what you’re doing, is a really useful experience in terms of figuring out how to communicate what it is you do meaningfully and help someone else kind of understand it so that they can give you effective feedback on the writing you’re doing. So those are some of the some of the initial things that usually happen in a first session.
Aimee: Yeah, I think that is such an underrated skill. There are going to be so many times for someone to ask you about your research. Maybe it’s a family member or friend, or maybe it’s when you’re looking at an internship or in some other professional space at a conference or something. If you can’t make it easy to digest for someone who has no idea what your research is about is not specialized in your area, and that’s really going to be difficult for you professionally. So I love that that’s something that you guys can help with, is just kind of starting that process of really thinking about, okay, how do I communicate what I do to someone who has no idea of what my field is about. And then how do I get kind of some of that on paper, too, to help me move forward. So thank you. I have heard that sometimes appointments, maybe you’re not able to get them as often as you want, or as I know some students would probably just spend all day with you all if they could. Yeah, but what does it look like to schedule multiple appointments? Is there a limit per quarter length of time? I think you talked about like an hour, but are there different kind of varying levels of time? Can you talk a little bit about that?
Evin: Yeah. So generally it’s it’s rare that folks, I think, hit a cap unless, you know, as you note, some folks absolutely would. And we love that, but also want to make sure we spread our ability to access the service around. So we do have a cap on how many appointments you can make per day and then per week. That is, you can have one appointment per day generally and two appointments per week. And we try and do that because we know some folks want to use it more. Or as people approach things like, you know, submitting dissertations, doing defenses, things like that, it can be really anxiety inducing, make people kind of desperate to get that feedback. But generally I like to make sure that we’re prioritizing at least some feedback for more people rather than a lot, you know, a handful of people getting a ton of feedback, potentially. You can make appointments up to two weeks out. So generally, if you’re being really conscious about when you want to make an appointment or trying to use it as a deadline to push yourself to have something to bring in, not that you have to have it, but a lot of people do like to use them that way. You can generally make an appointment up to two weeks out, no problem, and sometimes even up to a couple of days ahead. We usually still have openings. And we’re trying really hard to expand when we have appointment hours. So for example, this quarter we have several on the weekend and some evening hour appointments just because we know not all grad students, you know, want or need or can attend a sort of 9 to 5 business hour appointment. And so especially for professional students or grad students who might so be holding down a whole job like in education or nursing, we want to make sure that there’s a little bit of time that they can usually meet, too.
Aimee: Yeah, that’s great. I know I get to talk about that all the time with some of the programing at our office as well as like, I have a family. It’s really hard for me to come certain times. I need my partner maybe to be around to take care of the kids so that I can go in the afternoon. So that flexibility is really nice. Do you also offer appointments during like quarter breaks? I know you mentioned summer, so I think summer is a really big writing time for a lot of my grad students. So having you guys open during the summer is definitely really helpful. But what about like the winter break or spring break times? Are you available during then as well?
Evin: Yeah, we don’t usually have a full slate of appointments like we do during the quarter. Some of that’s just the nature of our graduate students are also students and we want to make sure that they have a bit of break in between each of the quarters. We do usually try to provide some kind of programing most of the time, or at least this past year, that’s taking the form of a writing retreat. Where we basically have a kind of longer three day version of the boot camps with some workshops mixed in. Those usually tend to be pretty popular, I think at, for example, our spring break writing retreat, we had about 20 people participating, both in-person and on Zoom. And yeah, we tried to make everything as accessible as we can. Offer in-person and offer remote over Zoom and the writing retreats. But unfortunately that’s kind of one of those situations where I’d love to say, yes, we have year round always all the time, but we do usually have a week or two break in between the services.
Aimee: Yeah, and most of the campus is closed down for some of the winter break. Yeah, but I do know spring break. I’ve had a couple of students that have done the retreat and really gotten a lot out of it, especially as they’re heading into maybe higher parts of their PhD program. So highly encourage those listening to take a look at when those are offered. I think that was my last question for you. Is there anything else that you want to add and share with our students?
Evin: Just that we really want to be a resource that meets folks where they are and is addressing their needs. So everything that we we try and offer, we’re kind of always changing it and trying to be flexible based on the feedback we’re getting. So with that in mind, I just encourage the graduate students on campus to always feel free to reach out to me directly to our main Writing Center email account if that’s easier for you to reach and just let us know what kind of programing or resources or support would be really helpful for y’all because we can try and like guess and make things all day long. But we really want to make sure that we’re addressing the felt needs on campus. And so to that end, it’s just always really helpful to hear that feedback from all the different grad students.
Aimee: Yes, I definitely think we talk about that in programing too. It’s like I have programing that I think would be fun, but I my students actually get to enjoy that. I don’t know. Yeah, I won’t know unless they tell me. So that’s why we have so many student leaders. So yes, please provide your feedback so that we can make sure that the things that we’re doing are actually benefiting all of you. But yeah, thank you so much for joining me today and we’ll maybe have you back on in the future to talk maybe more specifically about some of those writing retreats or things.
Evin: Sure. Anytime, Aimee, happy to come back.
Aimee: Thank you.