Writing Centers Do Not Work

I help my student to learn writing and English grammar, which is neglected in New York City K-12 elementary schools and in college.   My students write a page, which I correct; then, I have them rewrite the page.  Often there are more than two dozen corrections.  In making them rewrite the assignment, I refer them to web pages that discuss the grammatical reasons for the error.

The college has a writing center to which the students can take their assignments.  I do not encourage them to use it because they will not learn if someone else makes the corrections. The writing center is like a bicycle center to which people go to learn to ride a bicycle by watching others ride.  It replaces basic skills instruction with administrative therapy.

Higher education replaces math and English skills with therapy and social advocacy.  The students are badly educated but taught to nurse their feelings, to feel wronged, to lash out at others, and to identify supposed oppressors. They view their expensive, dumbed-down college experience as the financial  obligation of their oppressors, who in their view ought to be subjected to violent compulsion at their hands.  Higher education is a narcissists' and totalitarians' training process.

I am trying to figure out whether I should forbid the use of the writing center.  A student, who was unable to make the indicated corrections, just emailed that he would like to go to the writing center and have them rewrite the paper for him and then resubmit it a second time to get a higher grade. This is an episodic example of what education has become: feeling good and avoiding learning.  I can't reject the system, but I have done what I can to do so.

Another student, who took me in 2012, while I was still perfecting my current approach to writing instruction, recently wrote me the following email:

I don't if you remember me. I am a former student. You might recall I cried in your class in 2012. The truth is, I was going through a lot(Manic Depression and all the Jazz), and in retrospect- Your class was the single most important moment in all of my years at college. 

I remember like it was yesterday. You, critiquing all my work. The red ink all over papers. Talks of socialism, freedom, individualism, and self-esteem. During that time I didn't understand it all. I was young, and very naïve. I couldn't even read at a 12th grade level, but I tried my best. You gave me a C+ in that class, and in retrospect that was the most important grade I have ever had. 

The thing is, I have over the course of my years been torn between Capitalism vs Socialism, Individuality vs Collectivism, and having Freewill vs being guided through Determinism. I read, read, and read. I read many books, watched many lectures, and had many debates. It wasn't until I realize during all this debating that all this exploring I was doing and mass confusion was merely making me more aware. Yes, I said it. It was increasing my understanding of the world. Of the polarity which is associated with everything. 

I can't say I agree with you on everything. But I do want to formally thank you for "putting the battery in my back" as is often said.You are an amazing teacher, and at one point my arch enemy. I hated how you made me dislike Obamanomics, and found vested interest in Billionaire tycoons like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel.

Thanks for your inspiration!

Your former student,

By 2012 I had already discarded the twin assumptions in higher education: (1) the educator's job isn't to teach writing and other basic skills, and (2)  we should replace basic skills with administrative therapy.