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At
the Center for Academic Writing we aim to maintain high standards
of academic English throughout the university by providing students
with support and guidance in writing and other appropriate academic
skills, to ensure that their work within and beyond the university
meets the expectations of the international discourse community.
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Writing
Courses
To
familiarise students with the principles of academic writing
and help them acquire necessary skills, we offer courses in
both semesters. In the fall we cover critical reading, summarising,
and logical paragraph structure, as well as how to use sources
effectively, and how to structure research papers. In the
spring we focus on research proposal and thesis writing, helping
students frame their thoughts clearly with awareness for the
expectations of their audience. We can also provide workshops
on specific departmental genres or writing needs.
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Writing
Consultations
The
most important part of our work is individual consultations
with students on their departmental assignments. Last year
we held over 2400 consultations, reaching over half the MA
student body. The purpose of consultations is educational:
to help students to become better writers, rather than to
correct their papers. We strive to achieve this by discussing
their paper, their objectives and their general writing concerns
with them, or offering suggestions on conventions of academic
writing they may not be familiar with.
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How
you can help your students
If
you feel a student needs to improve some aspect of their writing,
such as organisation, clarity, argumentation, use of sources, style
or language problems please do recommend them to come to us for
consultations. It is also very helpful if you let us know that you
have referred a student to us, so we can tell you whether or not
this student has taken up your suggestion (click
here for who to contact). All students are informed about our
services during the orientation period, but some may not be aware
of their problems or because of deadlines may not have time to come
to the Center. We find that collaboration between faculty and the
writing center is most effective in encouraging students to seek
support. It is also very helpful if you set deadlines, where possible,
in the last four days of the week, so students have time to arrange
a consultation after drafting over the weekend.
We
encourage students to follow general principles of good writing,
but we may not always be familiar with specific requirements of
individual disciplines. For this reason, we always appreciate it
if you can help us by letting us know about specific demands appropriate
to the task you are setting, so that we can raise these points with
students. If students are confused or unclear, we customarily refer
them back to you to discuss the task again. If for any reason you
would like your students to complete an assignment without help
from the Writing Center, please let us know us in advance so that
we can turn these students away on this occasion.
While
we sympathise with the desire to see students' papers tidied up
to make them more readable, we believe that this short term goal
should take second place to that of helping students to write better
in future, so that they will leave the university equipped with
the requisite skills for life in the wider academic community. We
also feel it is important that students take responsibility for
their own work, especially when this is being graded. For this reason,
we refuse students' requests to proof-read or correct their work
for them, and we ask for your support and understanding in this.
As
one consultation is 30 minutes long, we are often unable to discuss
all the problems of a paper in that time. We encourage students
to revise their papers and where appropriate to return for a second
consultation, however, due to poor time management they may not
do this and weaknesses may remain in the final draft. If you notice
that the quality of student's work is rough in whole or in parts,
please encourage such students to make earlier and more effective
use of our services.
Support
for Individual Departments this Year (AY 2008-09)
The
following instructors are responsible for MA students in individual
departments this year. If you have any questions, please feel free
to contact them.
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John
Harbord (ext. 3196)
IRES,
Public Policy, Medieval, Economics
Eszter
Timar (ext. 3059)
Political
Science, Sociology, Environmental Sciences & Policy
Reka
Futasz (ext. 3265)
IRES, Public Policy, Philosophy
Andrea
Kirchknopf (ext. 3010)
History,
Gender Studies, Philosophy
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Robin
Bellers (ext. 6101)
IRES, History, Legal Studies
Tom Rooney (ext. 3238)
Sociology and Social Anthropology, Political Science,
Economics
David
Ridout (ext. 6100)
Gender
Studies, Political Science, Roma Access Program
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Last revised:
26 September, 2008
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