About

University Writing Services is committed to the campus-wide improvement of student writing through one-on-one peer consultations, the administration of workshops in classrooms (situated in the humanities as well as STEM-related fields), and the facilitation of asynchronous, written feedback in a digital environment. We want to cultivate an optimistic culture of writing on campus, to openly embrace the advancement of technology by helping students navigate virtual and multimodal composition in online programs, to help students identify themselves as writers within their respective disciplines, and to create a community of critically conscientious writers that will extend beyond college after graduation to the workforce.

We welcome all undergraduate and graduate students at Saint Louis University. All writers can benefit from feedback. We especially want to reach students in formative and critical stages of academic writing such as students making the transition to college writing, students registered for first-year composition courses in the Writing Program, transfer students, students learning English as a second language, international students, native and non-native students making the transition to graduate-level writing, students writing in the disciplines, at-risk students needing additional support, and students applying for graduate school applications, scholarships, and jobs both inside and outside academia. We also appreciate working alongside our partners including, but not limited to, the Aquinas Institute of Theology, the McNair Scholars Program, and the SLU Prison Program. Our ability to demonstrate how students can transfer skills into new stages of their lives is grounded in personalized plans for success that are constructed together through dialogic encounters. We believe our service to these populations will methodically make the SLU community stronger because writing is instrumental in all professions.

As part of the Student Success Center, our consultants are educators focused on the holistic development of students. We provide purposeful, developmentally appropriate opportunities for reflection and discovery. Individualized services allow us to meet students within their zone of proximal development. We offer feedback very intentionally, hoping that students will see the potential our consultants see in their writing. We want them to realize that their ideas, arguments, and written texts merit attention which can be accomplished by looking at their work through a different lens, from a different perspective. Writing is not a natural-born talent. Writing improvement is based on practice and how frequently students seek and implement feedback. It is a continual process. Essentially, a writing consultation is a structured model of experiential learning. It takes into account students with different learning styles (visual, aural, read and write, kinesthetic). We help, but we also ensure that students are taking responsibility for their own work and developing writerly personas. Our end goal is for students to become self-directed learners.

We offer assistance on any stage of the writing process. If a student wants to brainstorm an idea into an outline, we welcome the opportunity. If a student wants help formatting the final chapter of a dissertation, we welcome the opportunity. We want writers to come to us for any reason. We want those same writers to leave with a greater sense of confidence and purpose.

The writing center has 3 different locations on campus: Busch Student Center Suite 331, Pius XII Memorial Library Room 320, and Trudy Busch Valentine School of Nursing 114,. We are open 6 days a week. Writing consultations typically begin with a conversation about the context and audience surrounding the project, the due date, as well as the student’s vision and needs for the finished product. Once the goals are solidified, the project is read aloud, the consultant discusses higher and lower order concerns, and the consultant co-creates a plan with the student for completing or revising the project.

We also offer Zoom Video Conferences and Online (Asynchronous) Consultations. Zoom Video Conferences mimic face-to-face consultations, beginning with a conversation in which the student and consultant will co-create goals for the session. The student and consultant will then read the project aloud and the consultant will provide feedback verbally and by taking advantage of the chat function. In regards to the Online (Asynchronous) Consultations, the student will submit an Online Submission Form which will ask them to attach their project as a doc or docx file before their designated appointment time. They will receive feedback via email by 10:00 pm CST on the same day as their consultation.

We seek not only to help student writers, but to create an excellent educational experience for our entire staff comprised of undergraduate students, graduate assistants, and part-time staff. All consultants are expected to advance as academic writers, communicators, and professionals. We aim for the ongoing professional development of our consultants by assessing student outcomes, maintaining communication with faculty, and conducting research on writing pedagogy with an emphasis on facilitative feedback and positivity. Two of our primary forms of instruction include English 3890 and the Mentoring / Online Mentoring Program. The former is a semester-long practicum for undergraduate consultants. It is worth 3 college credits and fulfills a core requirement. The latter is a series of peer-to-peer observations broken down into three stages each with a pre-discussion, tracking form, rubric, and debriefing session. The rationale behind this type of mentoring is to provide new consultants with an additional resource beyond orientation and first week training sessions; to promote informal and ongoing training of all consultants; to recognize experienced consultants by assigning them as mentors; to increase collaboration by sharing effective strategies based on experience in a constantly fluctuating workforce; and to have mentors demonstrate how to conduct observations so that mentees can become mentors in subsequent semesters. This process promotes active learning by allowing mentees to start integrating appreciative consulting theory and practice into appointments in addition to providing a safe space for introspection, praise, constructive criticism, and gradual progression. Such experience is one of the hallmarks of consultant confidence, and consultant confidence is correlated with student satisfaction.