Undergrad Student Resources

The SSU Writing Center provides the university community with personalized support for nearly any writing task. We have well-trained tutors who can help you with anything from resumes and scholarship letters to graduate theses. This "personalized" support usually takes the form of one-on-one tutorials. We also offer workshops, group sessions, and a space for writers to discuss and work collaboratively. We also welcome students to use our computers for their writing.

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Graduate Student Resources

Group Coordination/Facilitation:
The key component of a successful graduate school experience is having good working relationships with peers. In addition to all the services available to the larger campus, the Writing Center can coordinate and/or facilitate a discussion group for people writing MA or MS theses or class papers or just trying to understand how to survive in graduate school. We can provide a meeting location (the W.C. itself), trained graduate student facilitators to help run meetings, group records-keeping and document distribution, and many other services--just ask.

Tutoring:
You can work one-on-one with trained grad student tutors on any issue related to writing. If you're having trouble settling on a topic for your thesis, we can help you settle on one; if you don't feel that you really ever learned how to use semi-colons, come see us. No topic is too small, and no questions are dumb.

Resources:
The W.C. provides instructional handouts, books, and online resources for you to consult. While the W.C.'s holdings in some areas are relatively limited (our bookshelves are small), we can easily point you toward good places to look, and we can help you learn to make the most of your writing handbook.

Workshops:
The W.C. can prepare and present workshops on writing-related concerns which a group of people share. We can present workshops in classes or, if a group of students identify common questions, we can present a workshop separately. The W.C. collaborates with the Coordinator of Graduate Programs to present workshops on basics of the master's thesis.

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Instructor Resources

In traditional liberal-arts education, writing is centrally important in courses across the curriculum. Good teachers use writing both to enhance learning in their courses and to develop students' knowledge of the writing conventions of their particular fields. If you're a teacher who wishes to use more or better writing in your classes--without necessarily increasing your workload--please look to the Writing Center as a resource for information and strategies. The W.C. offers several different services to teachers:

Handouts for Teachers:
Follow the above link to find our collection of PDF-format handouts designed to help teachers incorporate writing successfully into their classes.

Workshops:
Through the Center for Teaching and Professional Development, the Writing Center provides workshops which offer concrete suggestions and advice on several areas of concern: how to develop good assignments; how to respond to and effectively evaluate student writing; how to use writing to enhance learning in any given course; how to help particular kinds of writers (unskilled writers, second-language writers, etc.); and how to teach writing with sensitivity to issues of difference.
 
Consultations:
You can consult individually with the Director of the W.C. for tips on enhancing your writing instruction. Together, we can work to bring your writing assignments more closely in line with the purposes of your course; revise your existing assignments and develop new ones; formulate criteria for evaluation; and enable you to respond effectively to the students' papers, so that you enhance learning while wasting as little of your time as possible.
 
Meeting Facilitation:
The Director can meet with your department or other administrative unit in order to facilitate discussions about writing within your unit. Such meetings can help you clarify instructional goals and develop strategies for encouraging students' writing growth throughout their academic careers.
 
In-Class Workshops:
The Writing Center can help you prepare to teach specific units on writing-related issues. We offer workshops on how to teach a variety of critical reading and writing skills.
 
In-Class Writing Center Introductions:
Staff members will come to your classroom and provide ten-minute introductions to the Writing Center's services and resources.

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