In writing studies, a person who directs a writing program can be referred generically as a writing program administrator, or WPA. This term includes a number of roles, including director of first-year writing, writing center director, or writing across the curriculum director. Writing program administration comprises a significant area of inquiry within writing studies, with numerous conferences, journals, edited collections, and books dedicated to its study. In this chapter, I tend to use the term WPA to refer to someone who administers writing courses, although it is noteworthy that many kinds of WPAs, especially writing center directors, have worked for many years to adjust their practices and philosophies as they work with students in online environments.
Published in Chapter:
Reshaping Institutional Mission: OWI and Writing Program Administration
Jacob Babb (Indiana University Southeast, USA)
Copyright: © 2017
|Pages: 14
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-1718-4.ch013
Abstract
This chapter examines the relationship between online writing instruction (OWI) and the material and pedagogical impacts of OWI on institutions and their missions, using the author's regional campus to illustrate those impacts. First, the chapter explores the institutional mission and context of the author's institution, exploring how OWI works with and against the university's mission and how the growth of online instruction reshapes that mission. Second, the chapter asserts the need for professional development by exploring campus-wide resources for instructor training and then by detailing the writing program's efforts to provide discipline-specific training that emphasizes pedagogy and collaboration. Finally, the chapter asserts that writing program administrators are uniquely situated stakeholders on their campuses who can make a significant impact on the implementation and ongoing development of OWI on their campuses.