NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/comp/edu/composit/466

Text File | 1992-11-11 | 5.3 KB | 103 lines

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Subject: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Administrative "problems" with remediation (27)
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Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 10:31:03 GMT
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Entry: 27
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 04:45:06 EST
From: IN%"[e-mail]" Robert Royar, (C&CD Moderator)
Message-id: <1992Nov11.044506.v7.013.1.Grendel.Lair@Cratylus>
Subject: Administrative "problems" with remediation (27)
Reply-to: "Computers & Composition Digest (R. Royar)" <[e-mail]>
Organization: Cratylus Educational Software

At NYIT we're currently revamping our basic writing course.

Let me digress...

I began tutoring "at risk" students in writing when I was in high school.
I continued throughout college with students who needed help writing, and
on graduation began working first as a tutor and then a teacher in a
writing center devoted to basic writing. I still teach 12 hours per year of
basic writing. My point--I think I'm committed to basic writing as a
legitimate focus for full-time composition folks.

Now, working to revamp our basic writing (and ultimately all of first-year
comp) our committee has come up against some real administrative problems
caused by the way basic writing is "credited" and the effect open admissions
can have on attrition. We are an open admission private school with one of
the lowest (4 year) tuitions on Long Island. We advertise the fact that we
teach many first-generation college students (many first generation citizens
for that matter). We make an effort to keep students and even have a costly
program to help at-risk students. We're still facing major problems with
attrition (only among first to second year students) and with failure in our
basic writing sequence. We require orientation courses for any first-year
students who are placed in the basic writing (or math) sequence. Those
courses attempt to introduce non-traditional students to college.

Here are six (6) of the many problems:

1. We still get a sizable percentage (10-15%) of first years placed in
   basic writing who are traditional students. Among this group attrition
   is high after one semester. Exit surveys (while not statistically
   reliable) point to their feeling alienated and patronized by the
   "outreach" system.

2. We offer credit for the course in English, and Middle States Accred
   questions the awarding of college credit for the course.  On the other
   hand a non-credit course would carry little weight with students (most
   of whom have scholarships or loans which require full loads). Other
   departments who believe a 12 hour lit/writing requirement is already
   excessive (even though they still think their students cannot write
   well) are hesitant (vehemently against) a non-credit course that adds
   another five (5) hours to that total.

3. Unfortunately, I am the only "trained" basic writing instructor. Many of
   our BW instructors see their sole purpose as gatekeepers (not our
   current chair's (who (bless him) teaches the course) position I must
   add). Most still use the grammr-police approach and resist changing. Few
   have read Shaughnessy or the _Journal of Basic Writing_, or Enos, or
   Otte, etc. Most teach part time here and at other colleges.

4. Admissions attracts students and accepts students who are late deciders
   about college--most of whom never thought of attending college.  Many of
   these drop out after discovering that college is not vocational school.
   I mean this literally. One of my best writers who has had trouble
   adjusting to college--who walks up to me during class to ask to go to
   the rest room, and asks questions about holidays while we're trying to
   set up an assignment and others are asking about their writing--had been
   asking me about automotive courses.  I told him about our well-known
   Automotive Engineering program, but after repeated queries it finally
   came out that he had thought he could attend NYIT to get an Automobile
   Mechanics certificate. His is just one example of many where non-trad
   students come to the "wrong" college.

5. Because many of the admissions' recruiters/personnel have not themselves
   graduated from college, they are often not aware themselves what it
   really entails.

6. Basic courses are expensive. Well, we know they aren't when taught
   correctly, but the small class sizes they require and the extended hours
   they use make them appear expensive to the administration attempting to
   keep the major programs afloat (and keep accreditation).

I don't have solutions to these, but I believe as we discuss our own basic
writing curricula, we cannot ignore the rest of the college and its
perception of what we do (or the perception of outside agencies). So-called
remediation is a college-wide "problem" that because of writing/reading
requirements for all students English departments see more closely than do
many others.

 -- Robert Royar ([e-mail]) New York Institute of Technology
    "Do not search for the truth. Simply cease to cherish opinion."
                                                                - Sengstan

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