WVU Tutors attend 2009 MAWCA conference

On Saturday, March 27, tutors from the WVU Writing Center presented at the Mid-Atlantic Writing Centers Association Conference at York College in York, PA. Nathalie-Singh Corcoran (Director), Mary Inks, Emma Byrne, Ilene Funck, and Marie Pellegrino lead a group of about 30 participants through their interactive presentation entitled “How Do We Talk About Race When Race Isn’t an Issue?”

After completing inventories and responding to scenarios, everyone discussed their reactions to them and how best to discuss and deal with issues of race in their writing centers and universities. Talking about race doesn’t happen enough but is very important. Writing Centers are great places to start conversations about race and support anti-racist activism through discussions in tutor-training classes and at meetings/conferences. Through our MAWCA conference discussion, we decided that sometimes the best way to react to racist comments and engage in a conversation about race is to ask people “Why?” when they voice such remarks.

For further discussion on this topic, please visit the Antiracist Writing Centers blog at http://antiracistwritingcenters.blogspot.com/

Below are pictures from the conference. Enjoy!

Tutor Talk: Episode #2 - Common Misconceptions

Tutor Talk: Episode #2 - Common Misconceptions is now available for download on the iTunes Store.

In this episode John and Emma discuss 5 common misconceptions of the WVU Writing Center. They also talk about the differences in the Writing Center compared to the term paper clinic, as well as what tutors may or may not expect from a session if they've never been.

Also, John talks about a nightmare he had involving tweed jackets and MLA formatting.

All of this...and more, on this week's episode of Tutor Talk!

We recommend downloading Tutor Talk through iTunes via this link. iTunes is a free download to all users both Mac and PC. We will soon have a direct download link for all episodes for those of you who do not have access to iTunes.