Reading and Writing in a Digital Age

The Writing Center offers individual appointments, during which you can go over a draft your working on and get feedback, as well as workshops on topics relevant to your writing. Once you have a draft, you have some time before the revision is due.

If you think you’d like the insights of an “outside” reader–someone other than your professor and classmates, don’t hesitate to make an appointment for an individual appointment.  The Writing Center is not merely for writers who “need” extra help (e.g. struggling writers, which none of you are). It’s a resource for writers who want the insights of diverse readers.

If you don’t want to commit to an individual session, try out a workshop if one looks good to you.

“Still, we have become a society fearful of revealing who we are. The institutions that seek our support by sending us their brochures sound remarkably alike, though surely all of them– hospitals, schools, libraries, museums, zoos- were founded and are still sustained by men and women with different dreams and visions. Where are these people? It’s hard to glimpse them among all the impersonal passive sentences that say ‘initiatives were undertaken’ and ‘priorities have been identified.’” (My bolding. “On Writing Well”, Page 21)

This piece of advice from Zinsser, urging people to write personally, truly resonated with me. When I started looking into colleges in 11th grade, I asked for advice as to where to go. The responses? “Pick the college that feels right for you.” “Look for your best fit.” “Aim high and don’t settle.” While all “nice” advice, none of these sentences meant anything.

This issue was compounded by the media sent to me by various colleges. The sheer quantity of information I received on a regular basis via email, snail mail, and my high school’s college guidance department was overwhelming in itself. However, even when I could force myself to shovel away a little from this blizzard, I never encountered anything worth reading. Statistics and facts that I could easily look up on my own and general statements that could apply to dozens of other colleges were all that these brochures ever contained. There was never anything “human” to them.

And then I got the first piece of useful advice: “Why don’t you visit a bunch of colleges and just see which ones you like?” This didn’t come from my college guidance counselor– the closest thing I got from her was “Visit because they keep track of it and it may help your application blahblahblah…” It came from my mother: a 4th grade teacher.

Writing with humanity is essential. Without it, all writing falls flat.