To discover possible avenues for countering low attendance at the University of Southern Indiana's writing center by students in the two pre-core curriculum basic writing classes, this study explored the basic writing students' reasons for not attending the writing center. Since their attitudes toward writing and collaboration as well as some of their perceptions of the writing center seemed likely to influence their decision to attend or not attend, the study explored these areas as well. A survey of students in nineteen sections of the two classes, General Studies 098 and English 100, was the main method used in the study, with interviews with several volunteers from these courses supplementing the surveys. These methods resulted in a number of findings. First, the majority of students in both the surveys and interviews expressed preference for feedback from instructors over other resources, including writing consultants. The surveys also revealed possible gender and ethnicity differences in attitudes toward writing center use, including that males might be more reluctant to use the writing center than females and that non-white students were more likely to use the writing center than white students in spite of being less likely to perceive that the writing consultants care about their success. The survey results suggest a correlation between familiarity with the Writers' Room and positive perceptions of the service, although this finding was contradicted by the responses of one of the interviewed English 100 students and thus would benefit from investigation through further research. Finally, the survey results showed that even though students who expressed generally positive attitudes toward collaboration and viewed writing consultants as caring did not perceive the writing consultants as particularly helpful compared to other resources. These findings suggest that greater familiarity with the writing center--such as through required visits for students in the lower level course--might result in more students visiting as well as more positive attitudes toward the writing center.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Washington State University, August 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 118-125).

Thesis (M.A.)--Regis University, Denver, Colo., 2007. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on Mar. 13, 2007). "Higher Education Advising and Instruction"--T.p. Includes bibliographical references.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the discourses that author basic writing in Texas and question how instructors of basic writing at a community college are constructed as well as constructive through discursive practices. Elements of Critical Discourse Analysis (Luke, 1995-1996; Faircloth, 2000) were employed to analyze primary source documents, publications, presentations, meeting minutes, public forum transcripts, professional literature and policies pertaining to the practice of developmental English since the adoption of the Texas Academic Skills Program and the Texas Success Initiative. The discourses of failure, economy and science were identified as authoritative systems of conventions and norms that operate through the practice of basic writing. A Foucaultian genealogical lens was then applied both to explore the power relations and categorizations processes that undergird the material consequences (Valle, 2005) of the discourses as well as to identify how the narratives of basic writing faculty intersect with the discourses. Findings suggest that the discourses of failure, economy, and science function in a reciprocal manner to promote distorted truth claims about students and basic coursework that effectively limit possibilities for and lend to increased governmental control over the future practice of developmental education. The instructors’ stories, however, provide critical disruptions to the discourses. Viewing their alternative understandings of basic writing alongside the recurrent statements that have constructed popular understandings of developmental English, this study foregrounds the urgent need for more research from practitioners within the field and better channels of communicating their scholarship and professional experiences in the public arena. / text

Thesis (MTech (Faculty of Education))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-121). Also available online.

This project traces the ways universities articulate a desire for diversity through the gateway genres of college admissions, composition course placement, and first-year-composition (FYC). Together, these genres serve as points of access for a theoretical study that seeks to better understand the ideological function of writing programs to socialize borderline college applicants into the rhetorically constructed role of a Diverse College Student. I focus on what I call bootstraps genres--reoccurring rhetorical situations that call for students to recount social hardships like racism and classism as personal hardships to be overcome through personal heroics. Despite being immersed in rhetorics of individualism, the college application essay, the directed self-placement guide, and the literacy narrative all call for the mimetic construction of disadvantage as an appeal to college-readiness. As new college students move through the initiation rituals of admissions, orientation, and FYC, they are presented with rhetorical tasks that are both raced and classed. Bootstraps genres ask students to first read the university's desire for diversity and then fulfill that desire through personal stories of difference and disadvantage.

There is no abstract available for this dissertation. / Department of English

Thesis (Ph. D.)--The Pennsylvania State University, 2007. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 121-129).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Auburn University, 2008. / Abstract. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 123-139).