February 2024 UWP Announcements

Programmatic Textbook Based on the survey results from November 2023, we’ve decided to change textbooks for 2024-2025. The leadership team talked through the survey results with the UWP Committee, and after going through some options, the new textbook will be Everyone’s an Author (a Norton textbook—this also means that our publisher is changing). Yesterday, everyone teaching FYW … Read more

December 2023 UWP Announcements

Distinguished Student Writing As a reminder, we are again collecting student examples for the Distinguished Student Writing section on Hokieswrite. If you have papers that you wish to nominate, please follow the steps found here: https://hokieswrite.com/distinguished-writing/; we are in particular need of Worknet examples. However, please send on any exemplary examples that you have! Canvas Shells … Read more

November 2023 UWP Announcements

Programmatic Survey Last week, I sent an email to everyone teaching in the UWP, asking you to complete a survey about key programmatic issues. The survey closes this Friday, November 10th at midnight. If you haven’t already taken the survey, I would greatly appreciate your feedback. As a reminder, if you complete the survey, four respondents … Read more

September 2023 Announcements

September 20th Brown Bag Speaker Series On Wednesday, September 20th, from 12:15-1:15, in Shanks 370/380, the UWP is leading a session on AI in the writing classroom. Dale Pike, Associate Vice Provost for TLOS, will be leading the session, and we encourage everyone to come, especially if you know little to nothing about AI, as this session is … Read more

July 2023 Announcements

Pathways As  many of you saw this summer, Pathways is taking a break this academic year; this means you won’t have to submit data from your classes this year, which I’m sure is a relief to us all.  Textbook distribution I put hard copies of the 2023-2024 edition of Understanding Rhetoric in your mailboxes on … Read more

Joint Statement in Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic

In late June, the Council of Writing Program Administrators (CWPA) and Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) released a joint statement in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Broadly, the statement reaffirms well-established practices and priorities in effective writing instruction, situating those practices and priorities in the context of today’s global health crisis. The statement … Read more

Effective Practices for Online Writing Instruction

As part of the Virginia Tech Composition Program’s continuing preparations for fall, we share in announcing the following event and resources. Best Practices for Online Writing Instruction – 2-Day Online Course June 22nd, 1:00-2:30PM EST and June 23rd, 1:00-2:30PM EST ORJune 25th, 1:00-2:30PM EST and June 26th, 1:00-2:30PM EST The Council of Writing Program Administrators … Read more

Dartmouth Resources for Assignment Design

The spring semester has only just begun at Virginia Tech, so it’s a terrific time to be thinking about the subtleties of assignment design. The Dartmouth Institute for Writing and Rhetoric offers the best resources available to guide and support the assignment design process. Consider, for example, this, the first of eight suggestions for crafting … Read more