It happens at the beginning of every semester. Tucked into my tiny mailbox are a stack of about fifty blue and white student evaluations. The scantron sections of these evaluations, where students “rate” their professors in several categories on a scale of one to seven, never seem especially helpful to me. After all, it is inevitable that some classes will go better than others from semester to semester. And even when the students are responding to a specific prompt, such as “was the course material presented clearly” it is only natural that many of them are going to respond to their overall sense of the course, which is not limited to my instruction but includes their relationship to the course material—whether or not they “like” poetry, for instance—and the experiences, good and bad, that they have had with their fellow classmates. These evaluations, more cynically, as has been shown by many studies, are also often informed by the students’ own sense of whether or not they will receive the grade they wanted or feel they deserve. Because I am a demanding instructor and a moderately tough grader I often feel like I am actively sabotaging my student evaluation scores, which regularly tend to be on the cusp of the departmental average.
As most of us would agree, however, school is not about teaching, but about learning, and I have a feeling that many a “good” teacher is not necessarily helping their students to be good learners, and often the students themselves are the last ones to realize this, especially in classes like literature where quantitative measurements are impossible. How many times, after all, have we heard our students say to each other: “you should totally take a class with professor so and so, he’s a really cool guy”? For me, the point of teaching has always been very simple: make sure that the students think and learn, and it is the open response sections of the student evaluations that I actually find most helpful when re-evaluating the methods I use to achieve this goal. Sadly, most students skip this part of the evaluation, but those who do respond often offer a constructive view of their own experiences and struggles in the class. Many students say nice things, some occasionally complain, and others less frequently express anger. I have come to realize that those expressing anger are usually unhappy about the fact that the course was too difficult, that the reading was too boring, and most often, that there was just too much writing. In fact, one of the most common laments I have heard from my literature students (who are generally required to write two 10 page essays over the semester and regular 1-2 page informal responses for each class) is that it is unfair for me to require so much writing in a class that is not writing intensive.
This argument is perplexing. Although there is a part of me that sympathizes—after all, CUNY students have incredibly busy lives outside of school—I cannot help but think that if these students really feel this way, what does that say about their expectations about college work, and what do those expectations mean for the future of higher education more broadly? Should we, after all, require less work when our students complain or should we hold our ground? Is less work going to help them learn more and is the amount of work required for a class really up for negotiation? Where do we draw the line? And how much writing is the right amount of writing?
But these student complaints also raise a question that is specific to the work that we do here at the institute, and that is: has the creation and promotion of writing and communication intensive classes actually done as much harm as good? After all, aren’t writing and communication the very means of learning, and aren’t good writing and communications skills, the hallmarks of a good education? Shouldn’t every class be writing and communication intensive?
Despite the labors of countless writing program directors overseeing vast armies of composition and Rhetoric PhDs, there are always those students who seem to have a hostile relationship to writing: they don’t like it and they want to do as little of it as possible. Perhaps this resistance is natural for some people; as Frank O’Hara says of poetry: “if they don’t need poetry bully for them, I like the movies too. And Only Whitman and Crane and Williams, of the Americans are better than the movies.” To this I would add Stevens, but I digress. No one said students have to like writing, and bully for them if they would prefer to become filmmakers or beauticians, or whatever, but in a liberal university that values expression, eloquence, and clarity of thought, they should at least be asked to think write and communicate, and to do it often. How well they choose to write and with how much love and enthusiasm, is up to them. Writing and communication should not be a requirement, but a method and an expectation, like doing the assigned reading, or preparing for an exam. We should ask students to write not so we can evaluate them after all, but so that they can put their ideas into words, helping to improve their writing skills while simultaneously reinforcing the course material and making it their own. To expect students to fulfill a writing requirement or to fulfill a communication requirement only twice during their college career, only underlines the idea that the classes that emphasize these skills are just another hoop to jump through, like the general arts and science requirements: “Rocks for Jocks” geology classes or “Music Appreciation.”
I have always thought that writing intensive curricula were a good idea in principle, and still do. However, it is becoming increasingly clear to me that the way we have used writing and communication intensive classes are maybe not the best way to get students to learn. Instead of spending our time developing specific writing and communication intensive courses, which, in my experience are all too often not very intensive at all (some in-class writing and a few extra pages a semester tend to qualify as writing intensive for some courses), administrations should also be working with students and faculty to devise college-wide expectations for the kinds of writing, speaking, and interpersonal communication that should be practiced in all courses as often as possible. Courses in the humanities and social sciences, for instance, should automatically be designated as writing intensive, and professors should be encouraged to assign a minimum amount of regular written work for each. Likewise, instructors in professional programs and the sciences should be encouraged to integrate more speaking and interpersonal communication activities into their classrooms.
It seems clear to me that it has become all too easy for students to regard writing and communication as something distinct from the learning process, as a requirement to be fulfilled rather than a method of learning. Writing and communication intensive curricula, by compartmentalizing these activities, only reinforce the false dichotomy between writing and learning. If students are to learn to write, they must be required to write to learn.
Well James this is a wonderful post and I want to respond to so many parts of it. But perhaps like many of your students I don’t know where to begin and feel overwhlemed by the amount of wrok you might expect in response :). I want to respond in a practical way and suggest working with a blog for your students’ 1-2 page informal responses to the class work. It is amazing how seeing your work up on the internet in a glossy magazine style can really start students rolling.I also want to respond theoretically as I am very often an advocate for less is more. Writing is also about thinking and increasing the amount of words we have to define our thoughts. If they wrote less but revised more would they learn more? Open to debate…
Reply to Suzanne
Students must understand that writing is communication. Teachers must begin by understanding how students think. If you want to help students, see “Teaching and Helping Students Think and Do Better” on amazon.
Reply to Dr. Sanford Aranoff
Hi Suzanne,
I absolutely agree that re-writing is crucial for helping students learn how to write good academic essays, but what I was really trying to talk about in this post, and I probably didn’t do a very good job, was how we can get students to recognize and embrace the idea that writing is not something you do for a grade at the end of the semester or during a written exam, but rather that it is an essential part of the learning process itself. Requiring less writing undermines this important fact and reiterates the often problematic relationship that many students have with writing. I guess I am not as interested in making my students great writers–let’s face it you’re either a great writer or you’re not–but I am more concerned with making them competent and effective writers who understand the potential that writing offers and are unafraid of it. As far as I can tell–and my ignorance is vast–the only way for them to reach that state of comfort and confidence is to write frequently (ideally daily). High stakes assignments once or twice a semester, which many instructors still tend to assign, only equate writing with states of anxiety and fear.
Thanks for the comment.
James.
Reply to James
Really interesting post, James. Regarding demanding profs & evaluations: I once felt so overwhelmed by the reading expected of me in a doctoral level course that I was actually moved to comment on it in the end-of-semester evaluations. My main bone to pick was that it negatively impacted on class time– it’s difficult to have a productive discussion when everyone has only read one or two articles and skimmed the six other ones. I found myself feeling exactly as Baruch students often feel: “this is CUNY! I’m working! I’m busy! Waaah!” Looking back, however, I fear that I was a bit out of line; if I’m a doctoral student in Theatre, this is exactly the kind of challenge that I need to learn to cope with and master. So while it’s of course true that students should ideally see improving their writing as part-and-parcel with every course, it’s also true that they need to advance a whole menu of other skills for their ultimate goals (which are very different from mine). In an attempt to do this, I share articles with students about how important communication is in the workplace, but the truth is that their upcoming Statistical Analysis exam is *also* extremely important, and in their eyes, perhaps moreso. Finding a balance in terms of approaching that pedagogically is tough, especially since the question of context rears its head here. Perhaps some students arrive at undergrad ready to tackle any writing challenge thrown at them in any discipline, whereas others– especially when many are facing the kinds of communication obstacles that ESL students are– don’t have that level of ability from the get-go. What am I saying? That I agree with you 100% ideally, but on the ground, it’s sticky. The upside is that Fellows get many opportunities to forward the very message that you’re suggesting, even if it can seem from some glances like compartmentalization. For example, impressing upon students how essential different forms of writing can be within their own aspirations– memos versus emails versus executive summary versus cover letter versus essays– is one way to fold writing goals together with their own goals, which is key if they’re going to value progress in it.
Reply to Hillary
But the students do write a lot: letters, emails, text messages, perhaps diaries, or music lyrics. Yes, academic writing has its own language, style and genres. It is not always easy (or appropriate) to find a common ground between these genres. Although I can imagine designing an assignment in a politics class asking a student to write a letter to a friend abroad explaining some issue from American politics, I think it would be much harder to do so in disciplines which value rigid genre. My dilemma is this: do I try to creatively “stretch” and transform a writing assignment to reflect writing styles my students might be more familiar with (rap lyrics to explain mortgage crisis, anybody?) Or perhaps I owe them instead to rigidly teach the various styles valued by their disciplines? Do I owe it to them to challenge them to take their academic work seriously and see the difference between text messaging and more “serious” writing, instead of patronizing them with a “write your grandma a letter” assignment…
Reply to Agnieszka
Great post, James!Your post got me thinking about two things. One is students’ obsessions with getting a good grade (sigh), and the other one about the general fear and anxiety with writing for classes. I guess they are connected.I must say I have come a long way as a writer of English, as I am a second language user of English, and I still remember my very first months of doing coursework in English. Then ‘writing’ meant nothing but fear and anxiety. I felt clueless about how I start, frustrated that my English sounded so childish, had no idea how I go about coming up with ideas, revising, etc. etc. Even now, I still feel these feelings (when posting on cac.ophony too)! Also, I am now supporting (non-ESL) students who didn’t get a good grade in their past writing class. Many of them are so fearful of writing and totally convinced that they can’t write. It is very hard to make them understand that ‘writing’ is not a big deal and it can help you learn. So as much as I completely agree with you and your feelings towards the writing/communication-instensive instructions and its effect on the fundamental roles that written and oral communication *should* play in the students’ learning processes, I can also see the big psychological obstacle for certain student populations to overcome (besides the grade obsessions). I think that getting rid of this fear and anxiety is very important, and I try to do that to my own students, but I wonder if there are any ways to reach out to more students…
Reply to Yukiko
Two things occur to me, but first I will admit to some jealousy that Baruch has the Schwartz Institute and its cadre of people who care about quality communication. It’s this caring that provokes these useful discussions about the discipline, what it means, and how it can be instilled in others.The first point. Perhaps more outsiders need to come into the classroom and make the case why quality communications is an essential skill. I’m not sure that we academicians are always seen as having the credibility to make this case.The second point. We need to be sure we are setting good examples for our students. I’m sure all the Fellows demonstrate this every day, but the rest of us charged with this critical matter of establishing a meaningful learning environment need to make sure we are not undermining the good work of others.
Reply to James Drogan