Writing and Communication Center Faculty and Students Present at the 2020 Southeastern Writing Center Association Conference
Three faculty coordinators and eleven graduate and undergraduate student consultants from NSU’s Writing and Communication Center (WCC) presented on nine panels at the 2020 Southeastern Writing Center Association (SWCA) conference. The conference was hosted by University of Alabama-Birmingham in Birmingham, AL, Feb. 20-22. The 2020 SWCA Conference was attended by over 200 participants and featured 63 presentations from over 50 institutions.
From the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences, the following individuals presented at the conference:
- School of Communication, Media, and the Arts (and WCC faculty coordinators), Kelly Concannon (Associate Professor), Eric Mason (Associate Professor), and Janine Morris (Assistant Professor)
- Composition, Rhetoric, and Digital Media (CRDM) graduate students (and WCC graduate assistant coordinators), Monique Cole, Ricky Finch, Jordan Guido, Sabrina Louissaint, Danielle Pierce, ‘Aolani Robinson, Carlos Rodriguez Rosa
- CRDM graduate student (and WCC consultant), Angelica Zadak,
- Human Development and Family Studies undergraduate student (and WCC consultant), Mikayla Ruiz.
From the Dr. Pallavi Patel College of Health Care Sciences, B.S. in Speech-Language and Communications undergraduate student (and WCC consultant), Joy Oni presented.
From the Halmos College of Natural Sciences and Oceanography, Biology undergraduate student (and WCC consultant), Melissa Vas-Ayez presented.
“Since attending SWCA the past three years, I have been able to network with people I would not have normally met and expanding on those relationships has been a great experience. This conference has exposed me to new writing center research and it has been useful to take what we have learned to strengthen our center,” Ricky Finch.
To learn more about the NSU Writing and Communication Center, visit https://www.nova.edu/wcc/
About the Panels
“Changing the Culture: Serving Exceptional Students in the Writing Center” (Joy Oni and Mikayla Ruiz)
This workshop discussed ways writing center consultants can interact with and perceive individuals with exceptional cases, such as autism.
“Digital Wasteland: Rethinking Multimodality in the Writing Center” (‘Aolani Robinson)
The workshop explored strategies for working with writers who bring multimodal assignments, such as PowerPoints and infographics to the Writing Center for assistance.
“Expanding Inclusive Praxis: Toward an Everyday Queering of the Writing Center” (Jordan Guido and Carlos Rodriguez Rosa)
This workshop focused on how to better include queer identities in our current praxis.
“For the Expanding Ensemble: Create Connections in a Growing Writing Center with Improv” (Angelica Zadak)
This workshop focused on how to build connections within growing writing centers through the use of improv games and techniques.
“Game On: Designing a Digital Badging System for Consultant Training and Professional Growth” (Eric Mason and Ricky Finch)
This poster presentation focused on the idea that writing centers do not simply train consultants to work with student authors. Instead, they guide consultants’ professionalism and success throughout their academic careers and beyond.
“Graduate Students, Mentorship, and the Affective Dimensions of Writing Center Administrative Work” (Janine Morris and Kelly Concannon)
This presentation examined the preliminary results of a study of graduate student administrative mentoring relationships in writing centers.
“Growing a Writing Center via Course-Embedded Consultant Programming, Part I: Connecting to First-Year Composition Courses” (Russell Carpenter Ph.D., Eastern Kentucky University; Danielle Pierce; Ricky Finch)
This (first of a two-part) panel explored how two SWCA-based writing centers have experienced substantial growth through the creation of course-embedded consultant (a.k.a., writing fellows) programming that targets first-year composition courses.
“Growing a Writing Center via Course-Embedded Consultant Programming, Part II: Connecting to First-Year Biology Courses” (Russell Carpenter; Clint Stivers, Eastern Kentucky University; Kelly Concannon; Melissa Vaz-Ayes)
This (second of a two-part) panel explored how two SWCA-based writing centers have experienced substantial growth through the creation of course-embedded consultant (CEC; a.k.a., writing fellows) programming that targets first-year biology courses.
“Linked-In’ to the Writing Center” (Sabrina Louissaint and Monique Cole)
This workshop focused on how writing center administrators and consultants can effectively use LinkedIn to grow their writing centers.
