Welcome to the Writing Center! Here, you can receive personalized feedback and support on your writing from our professional consultants. Our services are open to all undergraduate and graduate students who are currently enrolled in a degree-granting program at Baruch.
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Our Services
We invite you to watch this video overview of the Writing Center’s services:
Across our services, professional consultants—dedicated teachers with many years of experience guiding undergraduate and graduate student writing—will help you develop your long term writing, editing, and revision skills. For the 2021-22 academic year, we offer the following services:
One-to-one sessions (synchronous):
- Online: Our 50-minute online consultations allow you to meet in real time with one of our professional writing consultants and make changes in a collaborative online workspace. You can meet using video, audio, or text-only chat.
- In-person: In our physical workspace in NVC 8-185, we offer a limited number of in-person, 50-minute sessions Monday-Thursday. Check our schedule to see who is available to meet on campus.
Written and video feedback (asynchronous): If you aren’t able to meet in real time with a consultant, you can still get feedback on your writing via email. Upload your draft, list 2-3 things you want feedback on, and one of our consultants will send you comments via track changes in MS Word.
Workshops: If you’re interested in practicing a specific academic or professional writing skill, you can register for an interactive 75-minute online workshop through our events calendar.
Writing guides: Find guides on a range of writing skills, including thesis statements, citation, cover letters, organization, and grammar.
Request accommodations and recurring sessions
- If you are working on a long-term project like a capstone or thesis, you can request recurring or extended sessions.
- If you need accommodations to fully participate in a Writing Center session, please fill out our accommodations form.
Our policies
- Consultants are teachers, not editors, so they won’t directly proofread or re-write your work. However, they will happily help you develop and organize your thoughts, revise for clarity and style, identify and correct grammatical errors, and break down the writing process into manageable steps!
- You can have up to two Writing Center sessions per week across all one-to-one services (including online sessions, in-person sessions, and Written Feedback), but only one session per day.
- You can attend as many workshops as you’d like! Workshops do not count towards your two sessions/week.
- You are expected to arrive on time and work actively throughout your session. If you are running late, please email us at writing.center@baruch.cuny.edu. We will hold your appointment for 10 minutes, but if you are more than 10 minutes late, we will cancel your appointment and offer the slot to another student.
- If you know you can’t attend your session, please log in to the scheduler and cancel your appointment or email us at writing.center@baruch.cuny.edu so that another student can get help.
- For more information on our policies, visit our FAQs page.
A typical consultation
The structure and focus of each consultation depends on your project and goals! However, 50-minute sessions are usually divided in the following way:
- Goal setting: You’ll spend the first 5-10 minutes of each session talking with your consultant about what you’re working on, where you are in the drafting process, and what you’re hoping to get out of the session. Based on this conversation, you’ll set goals for the session together.
- Main session: You’ll spend the majority of the session working towards those goals. You will write a lot—taking notes, brainstorming, revising, and drafting. Your consultant will help you learn and practice strategies for reading strategically, citing and responding to sources, developing arguments, meeting audience needs, and revising for clarity. There’s a lot of conversation, and plenty of time to answer questions along the way.
- Wrap up: As you approach the end, you’ll work with your consultant to write a session record, which describes what you learned, how you learned it, and how you can use it for future writing. You’ll receive this record by email, and you can also ask your consultant to send a copy to your instructor.
Signing up for an appointment
You can sign up for all one-to-one services through our online scheduler, accessible at https://bc.mywconline.com or by clicking “Schedule an Appointment” from the top menu on this website. If it’s your first time, you’ll be prompted to create an account. Complete the requested fields, click “Register,” and then log back in using the same credentials to view the schedule.
Scheduling one-to-one online sessions
- To schedule an online video, audio, or text-only session, click on any available (white) time slot to register. At the top of the schedule, you can also click to view the following week. If no open slots match your schedule, you can add yourself to the waiting list by clicking the “Waiting List: Date” link at the bottom right corner of each days’ schedule. You’ll receive an email or text notification if a spot opens up, and you can log in and claim the appointment.
- To access your online appointment, log in to the schedule 5-10 minutes before the start. On the main schedule, click on the gold box to open your appointment and then scroll down to click the red “Start or Join Online Consultation” link. In the consultation window, cut and paste your document into the workspace on the left and wait for your consultant to join the session. If you have any issues connecting your camera or microphone, check our troubleshooting guide for step-by-step assistance.
Scheduling one-to-one in-person sessions
All of the appointments currently default to an online session, so be sure to check the meeting options before choosing a time! On the lefthand side of the main schedule, we list who is available to meet in-person vs. online:
Click on any available (white) slot that matches your preferred time and mode, and save the appointment after you’ve answered the questions. For consultants available to meet in person, you’ll see this open when you go to save your appointment:
You can find us on the 8th floor of the Newman Vertical Campus, in 8-185 (near the central elevators). A staff member will check you in. If you can, please bring two copies of your draft!
Requesting written and video feedback
- To request Written Feedback, look for the drop-down menu in the middle of the scheduler’s main page. Select “Written Feedback,” and then click on today’s group appointment. The pop-up window will direct you to upload your paper as a Word document. Make sure that you include your assignment instructions, revision goals, questions, and deadlines. If your document is longer than 6 double-spaced pages, please identify a specific section you’d like the consultant to focus on.
- You will receive your feedback as an email attachment in about 3-5 days. To view your feedback, open the document in MS Word on your computer (not your mobile device) and make sure that comments and “Tracked Changes” are visible. You can also access your completed feedback through the online scheduler by logging back into your Written Feedback appointment and scrolling down to the “File Attachment” section. If the consultant replied by video, they will include the Zoom link and password in their introductory comment.
Preparing for a one-to-one session
- Try to schedule your appointment so you can draft beforehand, and leave enough time following your session to revise. You’ll want to put into practice what you learned.
- Locate copies of your materials ahead of time, including the assignment prompt, any instructor feedback, and drafts or notes that you’ve start to write. You can come to the Writing Center at any stage in the writing process, so don’t worry if you don’t have a complete draft!
- Before your session, take some time to read through your writing. Identify what you feel are the strongest parts, along with a few goals or areas that you’d most like to work on.
- For online sessions, log on a few minutes early to make sure that you have internet access and that your camera and microphone are connected (if you’re meeting by video or audio). If you have trouble getting connected, check our troubleshooting guide for help.
- If you have specific questions about your professor’s assignment or expectations, ask! The more you can tell us about the goals for your writing, the better.
