A Brief History of University Writing

Centers: Variety and Diversity

©2002 Susan Waller
Abstract
Today, writing centers thrive on many college and university campuses. Yet, this has not always
been the case. This paper traces the development of writing centers in the 20th century. Given
the variety and diversity of centers, their development is presented by theme rather than
chronology. After exploring some possible historical antecedents, the paper discusses the reasons
for founding, various names or images, staffing and pedagogy, and relationship to the university
at large. It concludes with a series of indicators that describe the current position of writing
centers.

Introduction
On the campuses of many American colleges and universities today, students frequent a
place that supports writing. And that support of writing may be the only commonality among
these places. They differ in name, staffing, method, funding, and emphasis; yet, they are joined
by their increasing presence and importance to the university community. In The American
College and University: A History, Rudolph defined the American university as a place with "a
remarkable diversity, an unwillingness to be categorized, a variety that would encompass
differences.1" This definition of variety can be applied as well to the writing centers that
developed as part of the university. Kinkead and Harris in Writing Centers in Context asserted
this diversity as the major commonality among centers.2 In a National Conference of Teachers of
English (NCTE) statement, Harris described "writing centers [as] exist[ing] in a variety of
shapes, sizes and settings."3
It is this very variety, however, that makes the writing of an official, chronological
history of writing centers difficult. As Carino noted in "Early Writing Centers: Towards a
History," it is easy to document writing center history from the 1970s, but more difficult before
that time.4 In addition, "official" writing center history (at least in 1995 when Carino’s article
was published) presented the development of writing centers as evolutionary and progressive. It
described early centers as inadequately staffed, poorly funded outgrowths of the English
department, frequented by freshmen or delinquent students, therefore on the periphery of serious
academic work done at a university.5 But on deeper examination, this characterization has not
always been accurate. Although writing centers have certainly progressed, Carino argued that
their history is not as linear or simple as often presented.6
This paper will examine the writing center in its parts to achieve a greater understanding
of the development of the whole. After exploring some possible historical antecedents, it will
focus on the reasons for founding, various names, or images, staffing and pedagogy, and
relationship to the university at large. Arching over this, however, the literature clearly shows
that amidst all the diversity, the one consistency is that the writing center developed in the
context of the college or university, is shaped by the mission, models, and materials of its parent
institution. Harris asserts that the idea of a generic writing center makes us uneasy because it is a
truism of this field that writing centers tend to differ from one another because they have evolved
with different kinds of institutions and different writing programs and therefore serve different
needs. But by surfacing our traditions, we can formulate some general truths about similarities
among different writing centers.

Historical Antecedents of the Writing Center

The first hints of writing centers do not appear until the early years of the 20th century,
and centers were not "professionalized" until the 1970s. But American college history reveals
several places where writing center work was being done long before centers came into
existence, primarily in tutorial and conference settings but possibly also in the early
extracurricular vehicle known as the literary society.
Although no direct link exists between 18th century literary societies and 20th century
writing centers, a comparison of the two makes such a connection tempting. Rudolph described
literary societies as those places on campus where students "owed their allegiance to reason, and
in their debates, disputations, and literary exercises, they imparted a tremendous vitality to the
intellectual life of the colleges."8 Headed by students, not professors, the societies often ran
counter to the ethos of the college that emphasized character over intellect and rote learning over
discussion and debate.9 Several aspects in this description echo in definitions of writing centers.
Like the literary society, the writing center is student-centered, where students work with peers
or with faculty in a collaborative way.10
Using this interactive method, the center also emphasizes the process of writing, seeking
as North said "to produce better writers, not better writing."11 And like the literary society, the
center has been seen as counter to the university, especially in its collaborative methods,
described by Harris as "the antitheses of generic, mass instruction."12 However, the comparison
cannot go much farther because literary societies are firmly anchored in the extracurricular as
Rudolph pointed out,13 but writing centers emanate from the curricular. Boquet admitted that she,
too, given "the politics of location," would like to connect the writing center to the
extracurricular, but found "scant support in the early articles on the writing lab method."14 In
spite of this difference, the similarities between society and center are suggestive. Almost two
hundred years before the first writing center was started, something akin to it, something that
supported intellectual growth as seen in spoken and written communication in the context of
one’s peers, existed on the American college campus.
Besides the historical echoes of the literary society, writing centers also have an historical
antecedent in tutoring services. In "The Bottom Line: Financial Responsibility," Jolly argued, via
Rudolph, that preparatory work has always been done at the college level. Historically, tutors
were poor scholars whose services were underwritten by the student’s family. In other instances,
tutoring was provided by "honor societies or social organizations" that paid for tutoring for their
academically underprepared members.15 In the 1950s, colleges offered free tutoring for athletes
and World War II veterans, usually paid for by the athletic department or the GI
Bill.16 According to Jolly, "an estimated one-third of the 11 million veterans" 17 used the GI Bill,
and many of them needed academic assistance. A striking difference between this mid 20th
century tutoring and earlier tutoring was that the student and his or her family did not pay for the
service; it was provided by the institution.18
 In the 1960s, as one outcome of open admissions, universities provided low- income,
underprepared students with tutoring. Again, Jolly noted that this service was free for students
who met government criteria.19 Therefore, by the late 1960s, academic assistance was available
for athletes, veterans, and low-income students, paid for by the college or the government.
Wealthy students, as had always been the case, could afford private assistance. Jolly pointed out
that the overlooked group was middle-class, underprepared students, who mainly were financing
their own education.20 Many of the writing centers that developed in the next decade would
address the needs of those students.
A third historical antecedent came from the composition classroom and also served as an
impetus for the founding of writing centers. As will be explored in the next section as well as the
section on names, the earliest centers grew out of a conferencing method used in composition
classrooms.21 What these three forerunners of the writing center show is that the kinds of work
done at the center and the atmospheres engendered were not completely foreign to the university
community.

Reasons for the Founding of Writing Centers

Although one can find historical antecedents, however tenuous, for the kinds of work eventually
done within the walls of the writing center, more than these antecedents needs to be considered
when discussing the reasons for the founding of writing centers. Research shows that there are
almost as many impetuses as there are centers; however, they can be grouped around several
themes: outgrowths of the classroom, sites for remediation and/or proficiency work, support for
writing across the curriculum programs, or havens for writers of all kinds.
The earliest writing centers, often known as labs whose purpose was to enhance writing
instruction, were an extension of the classroom. Carino noted that initially writing labs began
within the context of the classroom,22 prompting Boquet’s distinction that labs were viewed more
as methods than sites and often focused on the grammatical aspects of writing.23 However, she
noted that they did provide opportunities for students to write and revise.24 Eventually, method
changed to site as the work moved out of the classroom and became an addition to the classroom,
following the scientific model of the lab as an extension to classroom work.25
A second impetus for the founding of writing centers involved remediation. Several
historical events served to change the emphasis of the writing center from the classroom and
from helping writers in general to proficiency and remediation. Among them are events in the
1930s, World War II, the Civil Rights movement that created affirmative action and open
admissions, and the literacy crisis of the 1970s.
Though the term "open admissions" is usually applied to the late 1960s and early 1970s,
colleges and universities in the 1930s saw an influx of new, underprepared students, whose
parents had never attended college or who were immigrants. Writing labs provided a place for
needed remedial work.26 Further, Carino saw a writing center antecedent in the Armed Forces
English program, developed in the 1940s to prepare World War II officers in a short time. The
self-paced and intensive program, which on many campuses became the foundation for later
communication programs, encouraged the lab approach.27 By 1950, a survey conducted by
Illinois University’s Writing Lab director, Robert Moore, found that 70% of the colleges who
had responded to his survey conducted remedial programs at their centers.28 The remedial nature
of this work led to the view that early centers were "fix-it" shops.29
Although some writing centers tried to attend to global writing concerns as well as
grammatical ones, their institutions often forced them into remedial work. Already twenty years
old at the time of Moore’s survey, Iowa University’s center was begun by Carrie Stanley as a
writing laboratory where the weaker students who had been referred to her class "labored" to
improve skills.30 However, as Kelly noted in his history of that center, Stanley did not give
students worksheets and drills; instead, she worked individually with them. Eventually this
extension of her classroom became a site that provided additional work for weaker students.
Finally, attendance became voluntary on the student’s part or suggested by a professor, and
eventually required as a consequence for failing the writing competency test.31
By 1945, the emphasis of the Iowa center was changing. Having been officially
recognized by the university, Stanley’s center, once a place where students worked individually
to improve their writing, became the place "to provide instruction for the students whose
placement themes did not meet departmental standards." 32 Now the center’s work involved
facilitating, grading, and re-teaching proficiency skills. The addition of proficiency to Iowa’s
program and the emphasis on "diagnosis and prescription" as well as remediation revealed in
Moore’s survey support Boquet’s observation that changes in higher education in the post-World
War II era created an emphasis resulting in a focus on the individual, practical, skills-centered
nature of composing."33 Students came to the lab as individual writers to improve the
grammatical aspects of their writing.34
This intertwining of proficiency and remediation would also provide the impetus for
many writing centers in the late 1960s and early 70s. At least two waves of open admissions
occurred in the second half of the 20th century. An early one, post-World War II, brought large
populations of veterans to college campuses. As was discussed in the first section of this paper,
they often had their own tutoring services.
The second wave of open admission began in the late 1960s. A number of articles in
early volumes of writing center scholarship and in articles outside of the profession often begin
history here,35 even though there is ample evidence of writing centers before this time. However,
the field certainly did explode in the early 1970s.36 A primary reason for this expansion was the
open-admission policies adopted on many college campuses during this era. Open-admission
policies, such as City University of New York’s (CUNY) in 1966, came as a result of affirmative
action and the growing discontent of those segments of society who previously had not had
access to college. Boquet noted that growing minority populations and increasing enrollment
created problems that "university officials had difficulty even naming," yet they hoped the
writing center would remedy.37
In "The Evolution of a Writing Center: 1972-1990," Yahner and Murdick described the
results of open admissions including changes in race and socio-economics, and also "sheer
numbers"38 – more students had to be accommodated at the university. Part of this
accommodation occurred through the introduction of developmental or basic courses, but at
University of California, Riverside, minority students resented placement in basic English
classes, seeing them as discriminatory. As an alternative, writing center visits did not carry the
same stigma as did basic classes.39
On the heels of open admissions came the literacy crisis of the 1970s, 40 the beginning of
which is usually traced to Sheils’s article, "Why Johnny Can’t Write," in Newsweek, that argued
for weakened literacy abilities based on falling SAT scores among other indicators.41
Administrators charged writing centers with the responsibility of reversing this trend. Harris
noted that many centers, including hers at Purdue, were started as a place to help many students
with deficient writing skills.42 Yahner and Murdick traced two prevalent views of teaching
composition to the remedial work done in the center. One view of composition sought to
perpetuate formal English through grammar and other mechanical work while the other view
addressed usage and style as well as mechanical concerns, "helping students develop and test
ideas in writing."43 Consequently, some writing centers existed to help low achievers and low
scorers to improve their basic writing, especially through drill and exercise. Of the twelve centers
presented in Writing Centers in Context, three began solely as remedial services and five others
included such work in their descriptions.44
Although many centers emphasized remediation as an outgrowth of courses and concerns
internal to the university, a few centers, the University of Delaware, and Widener University
among them, began from general remediation concerns that had emanated from outside of the
university. At Delaware, several companies, major employers of university graduates,
complained of poor writing skills. At Widener, one trustee in particular who had hired several
graduates lobbied the president for a program to improve writing skills on campus.45
But not all centers saw themselves as supporting specific writing done in composition
classrooms, propping up underprepared students, or guaranteeing the writing skills of their
institution’s graduates. The final reasons that led to the creation of writing centers were more
generally conceived. Some centers were outgrowths of writing across the curriculum (WAC) or
writing in the discipline (WID) programs. These programs encourage writing in all the
disciplines, not just English or the humanities. Writing centers are situated to support these
programs, and as Waldo argued, even coordinate them.46 Eight of the twelve centers presented in
Writing Centers in Context have a direct connection to their university’s WAC program.47 Harris
noted the WAC context as a major trend for writing centers in the 1990s.48 These centers, and
increasingly more and more centers, hope to foster and encourage individual thinkers and
writers.49 Ideally, most writing centers want to be seen as places where all writers within the
university community can find thoughtful, competent readers of their writing.

Various Names or Images of Writing Centers

As well as having multiple reasons for their founding, writing centers have been known by
multiple names. Primarily, three terms have been used for these spaces on campuses that support
writing: lab or laboratory, clinic, and center. Given the fact that the majority of writing center
personnel have English backgrounds, a center by any other name does not necessarily smell as
sweet. As writing center theory and practice developed, its adherents formed strong opinions
about titles, attaching metaphorical significance to each term. As Carino noted in "What Do We
Talk about When We Talk about Our Metaphors?: A Cultural Critique of Clinic, Lab and
Center," these metaphors reveal much about the emphasis of the staff and center as well as the
relationship to the university at large.50
The earliest spaces called themselves labs or clinics. Boquet noted that there was
overlapping between site and method, with method often preceding site.51 In fact, according to
Carino, early centers did not see themselves as different from the classroom, but as outgrowths
of the classroom, providing time for individual to receive assistance from teacher and peer
interaction. The earliest reference Carino found was in 1904, in St. Louis high school teacher
Philo Buck’s "laboratory method." His students chose topics, conferenced with him and with
their peers. They used class time to accomplish this.52 During the next two decades several
similar programs began at both the high school and college level, so many that by the late 1920s
enough programs existed to provide research for a master’s thesis by a West Virginia teacher.53
In the 1930s, the University of Minnesota and the State University of Iowa created labs
separate from the classroom. Minnesota’s was a "large, well-lit room with writing tables and
reference books, as well as a smaller anteroom where students and tutor could conduct individual
consultations.54
In the 1940s, the terminology, perhaps showing a connection to psychology and
medicine, shifted to clinic. At least one clinic implemented a "psychotherapeutic approach to
writing lab work."55 The University of Denver shifted emphasis to "Rogerian non-directive
counseling," to bolster students’ self-esteem, to help them overcome fears and compensate for
deficient skills because of poor education or background.56 Although Carino noted that this
approach was highly criticized and did not last long officially, Boquet argued that the
foundations of non-directive tutoring and of providing a safe haven for students who come to the
center began here. She also asserted that it was "through this therapeutic closed-door policy that
writing centers [began] to engage in some versions of counter-hegemonic work."57
Even if Denver’s overtly medical paradigm did not last, the vestiges of "clinic" remained.
Moore, writing in 1950, reporting on his survey of writing clinics and writing laboratories, made
copious use of medical terminology. He saw clinics as places of "diagnosis and prescription" and
talked in terms of clinicians and specimens of writing.58 For Moore, garbled writing may come
from garbled information or "habitually confused thinking"; in that event the student should be
referred for psychological help!59 Moore asserted that the clinic or laboratory is valued for its
"ready accessibility, its concentration on the removal of specific deficiencies, and its
development of instructors particularly skilled in remedial procedures"60. Eventually, however,
the term clinic fell out of favor in part because, as Carino noted, it ended up treating students for
an illness and implying an objective standard of writing to which everyone must aspire.61
Where the term clinic seemed to conjure up medical and psychological connections, the
term laboratory evoked scientific ones. Initially containing the positive images of
experimentation, especially when combined with the new process approach to writing, the term
turned pejorative as the laboratory became the place to do what classroom teachers did not want
to do – grammar. Increasingly, labs were seen only as places for remediation or places some
students may select to go. Writing lab attendance was not required as in the scientific context.
Work in the writing lab was not presented as an integral part of classroom. Carino observed that
Not to require all students in all writing courses to work in the lab was to deny that the kind of
instruction it offered is integral to learning to write. To require the lab of only basic writers was
to infuse the metaphor with connotations of punishment meted out to those who dared to be
ungrammatical.62
As more and more centers opened in 1970s and 1980s, the preferred term became center.
Centers meant, according to Harris, people with people.63 As centers, these spaces, in North’s
words, sought to become "the centers of consciousness about writing on campus, a kind of
physical locus for the ideas and ideals of college or university …or writing."64 Harris noted that
centers were often cast in "nurturing, nutritive analogies… [seen as] nurturing, helping spaces
which provide assistance to other writing centers and sustenance to students to help them grow,
mature, and become independent." 65 Where earlier labs and clinics may have relied heavily on
machinery such as cassette players and headphones, carrels for individual work, and skill and
drill exercise handouts done at an individual pace, centers focused on conversations at tables in
open areas with skill discussions emanating out of the text in front of the readers.
Although writing center history cannot be seen as a simple linear progression, as more
and more centers emerged in the later decades of the 20th century, the nomenclature progressed
from lab and clinic to center. Today, most of these spaces are called centers. Those working in
labs are often strongly urged to change their name at annual conventions. At least one vestige of
the past remains, however. Perhaps in deference to the past and to differentiate its less formal
style from The Writing Center Journal, the Writing Lab Newsletter elected to keep the term lab.66

Staffing and Pedagogy in Writing Centers

As the discussion of the names and metaphors reveals, writing centers contain a variety
of interactions. These interactions have directly influenced staffing. Yet, despite the variety of
staff configurations, most centers rely on some sort of collaborative methodology in opposition
to the traditional teacher-centered method found in many classrooms.
Staffing at writing centers has two primary paradigms, faculty based or student based.
The earliest centers were staffed by faculty since for the most part they were outgrowths of
composition classes, such as Stanley’s at Iowa.67 Even those centers that served a wider campus
clientele than first-year-composition students employed faculty and graduate assistants.
However, as Carino observed, these faculty members made deliberate efforts to set aside their
authority when working in the lab. Buck, who founded one of the earliest labs, suggested that
those who would work in that setting must "come down to the same plane with your pupils and
then you can help them."68
Several of the labs that started in the 1930s and 1940s employed graduate assistants
working closely with faculty members.69 What seems significant, however, is that from the
beginning there was acknowledgement that the teaching done in the writing center context was
different from that done in the classroom. It was, Carino noted, "not assumed that just any
faculty member could work in the lab."70 The early literature revealed the development of
specific pedagogy for writing center instruction and a need for resourcefulness and flexibility on
the part of the instructor.71
The acknowledgement of the writing center as a place other than and different from the
classroom perhaps set the stage for the introduction of peer tutors in the late 1960s and early
1970s. As noted earlier, although centers existed before this time, many new centers emerged on
college campuses during this era. Early on, some writing center faculty, notable Bruffee, found
great resistance from students to the idea of meeting with a faculty member, even in the writing
center context. Bruffee observed that some students who should be prepared for college work did
not succeed. It seemed that these students had "difficulty adapting to the traditional or ‘normal’
conventions of the college classroom."72
To reach these students, Bruffee and others adapted peer tutoring to the writing center.
Seen as "radical" – to fit the times – this method of teaching was an "alternative to the
classroom."73 Peer tutoring provided a reciprocal method of instruction. Tutors both taught their
fellow students and learned from the experiences. Interactions were collaborative. The content
learned was not altered, but the method of delivery or the "social context" was changed.74
Boquet noted that peer tutoring helped to solve two on-going dilemmas in writing center
contexts: "the call for human contact and the very real fiscal constraints faced by labs."75 These
centers, now inhabited by students who tutored there as well as brought their own writing there,
took on a different flavor, a decidedly undergraduate one,76 hearkening back, albeit still
curricular, to Rudolph’s description of the literary society.
Both the setting aside of instructional authority and the development of peer tutoring laid
the foundation for the significance of collaboration in writing center theory and practice. Scores
of articles about collaboration appeared in both the Writing Lab Newsletter and the Writing
Center Journal. In the official NCTE statement about writing centers, Harris described tutors as
coaches and collaborators, not teachers. …Tutors do not evaluate their students in any way
because the tutor’s role is to help students, not to lecture at them or repeat information available
from the teacher or textbook. Instead, tutors collaborate with writers in ways that facilitate the
process of writers finding their own answers.77 In recent literature, some writing center scholars
have questioned, and even criticized, collaboration.78 However, collaborative methods of some
sort currently form the basis of most writing centers.

Writing Centers' Relationship to the University

The penultimate section of this history of writing centers addresses the centers’ relationship to
their universities. Seen especially in the impetuses for founding, centers are intricately attached
to their sources. Again, to quote Harris: Writing centers "have evolved with different kinds of
institutions and different writing programs and therefore serve different needs."79 Two areas that
illuminate the attachment are the center’s funding sources and the university’s attitude toward
the center.
Writing centers have been funded in a variety of ways. As outgrowths of the classroom,
early centers were funded through their departments, primarily the English department and often
staffed through release time.80 In 1950, Moore found that few charged fees; most were free
"accepting the handling of remedial composition problems as a necessary, if deplorable, part of
the task of American colleges and universities."81 He described them as self-made centers,
funded by the English department or dean and staffed by department and graduate assistants.
Some schools still fund centers directly from the English departments, while at others, the
funding flows from the college that houses English, such as Arts and Science. In their survey of
twelve writing centers, Kinkead and Harris noted four that were directly funded by English, two
by the writing program, and four by the supporting college within the university.82 At a few
schools, the center was funded by a specialized area, such as ESL, basic skills, or minority
affairs.83
Another monetary issue that has greatly affected writing centers is the consistency and
availability of funding dollars. Much of the literature that discussed funding comes out of the
proliferation of centers in the 1970s. Many of these centers started on soft or grant money.84 This
funding source put them in precarious situations. Space for centers was limited, with centers
ending up in basements or broom closets.85 Directors had no guarantees of jobs from year to
year. After staff was paid, little money was left for supplies or furnishings. Writing center
literature abounds with stories of scavenger hunts for tables, chairs, and other equipment.86 In
1981, the NCTE issued a statement calling faculty status for writing center directors.87 Today,
more and more centers are funded directly through their unit’s budget rather than relying on
annual grants.
How the university at large views the writing center has long been a concern of writing
center directors, faculty and tutors. North began his almost canonical 1984 essay, "The Idea of a
Writing Center," by bemoaning the ignorance of the university at large, particularly his
colleagues in English departments, to the work of the writing center. He gave example after
example of misunderstanding of and condescension toward centers, describing faculty who saw
centers as "fix-it shops" or "giving first aid and treating symptoms."88 This attitude had surfaced
earlier in Hayward’s survey which found that most faculty referred students to the writing center
for grammar and punctuation and are not receptive to other, more primary, aspects of the
center.89 In a 1990 article, Harris referred to "a tradition of misunderstanding," which she
suggested came from the radically different educational perspectives held by classroom faculty
and writing center faculty.90
 Yet, this ignorance is nothing new. In 1950, Robert Moore berated those faculty who
refused to see the value of writing centers. Faculty "complain," Moore said, about the quality of
their students’ writing, but they rarely address the issue themselves with their students in their
classes.91 For Moore, student indifference stems from faculty indifference…. I remarked earlier
on the difference that often exists between the quality of the writing which a student can produce
when he is aware that his writing skill is to be considered and that of his habitual writing. If
instructors in non-English courses would insist on the best writing of which the student is
capable, they would find – amid much student grumbling – that the English departments have
builded (sic) better than is often supposed.92
In some cases, that ignorance has given way to an adversarial stance, questioning the
legitimacy and ethics of writing centers. In "What Composition Teachers Need to Know about
Writing Centers," Powers noted that some instructors view writing center staff as assistants,
while others are wary of divided loyalties in their students. She argued that composition
instructors need to know the value of peer tutors and understand the collaborative learning
model.93 Some faculty, Maxine Hairston in particular, even questioned the legitimacy of writing
centers, seeing them as improvise[d] ad hoc measures to try to patch the cracks and keep the
system running….[These] writing labs sprang up about ten years ago to give first aid to students
who seemed unable to function within the tradition paradigm. Those labs are still with us, but
they’re still only giving first aid and treating symptoms. They have not solved the problem.94
In addition to questioning legitimacy, faculty questioned the ethics of the work done at centers.
Clark and Healy noted that faculty "continue to express concern that the sort of assistance
[given] may be inappropriate."95 The improprieties involve plagiarism and questions about
ownership of texts. In response to these concerns, many writing center theorists advocated what
came to be known as non-directive or "minimalist tutoring." 96 Described in articles and texts in
the early 1980s,97 minimalist tutoring was fully defined by Brooks in 1996 with caveats such as
these: "Sit beside the student, not across a desk…; try to get the student to be physically closer to
her paper than you are…; sit … [so as to] make it more difficult for you to write on the paper [,–]
better yet, don’t let yourself have a pencil in your hand; have the student read the paper aloud to
you."98
Yet, not everyone in the writing center community agreed with these techniques. Seeing
them as defensive and not necessarily in the writer’s best interests, Clark and Healy argued for a
continuum of tutoring practice that is proactive, rather than defensive. Since a "hallmark" of
writing center theory and practice is "individualized writing instruction," according to Clark and
Healy, writing center instructors or tutors must make use of a variety of methods, both direct and
indirect, to assist each writer in the best way possible. 99
Rather than react to critics in a defensive manner regarding legitimacy and ethics, many
writing centers actively communicated their mission and methods to their academic community.
Yahner and Murdick noted the importance of formulating an appropriate response to critics:
Writing centers are not monasteries, not safe enclosures in which the spiritual work of tutoring
and speculating about the ‘riddles of convoluted syntax’ can proceed untouched by the vulgar
discord of the academic world. We must recognize our vulnerability, our penetrability, and
prepare to live politically if we are to continue to grow as progressive resources within … higher
education.100
Not all centers at all times have had to deal with negative attitudes from faculty.
Especially on campuses with Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) or Writing in the
Disciplines (WID) programs, or with strong commitments to writing, the writing center has
enjoyed the support and partnership of faculty and administration committed to writing. 101
Although the legitimacy and importance of writing centers is firmly established on many college
campuses, not all of the negative attitudes have been disarmed. Harris advocated research and
articles published in non-writing center journals as a means of educating the uninformed and
answering the antagonistic.102

The Writing Center Today

Over the past century, writing centers have move from method to site, from margins to
the center. They are recognized and accepted on college campuses as advocates of writers of all
kinds and at all levels.103 Many current elements point to this acceptance. First, years after the
NCTE statement concerning the status of writing center directors, many directors are tenured
faculty members and advertisements for directors indicate a desire to hire those with terminal
degrees and writing center experience.104 In addition, writing center staff are seen as
professionals. Second, regional writing center associations and the International Writing Center
Association (IWCA) exist to support the work writing centers do.105 Third, writing center
research in practice and theory is directly supported by two organs, The Writing Lab Newsletter,
begun in 1977, to support practice, and The Writing Center Journal, founded in 1980, to support
research and theory.106 In addition, a writing center archive and research project is on the
Internet. 107 Fourth, in addition to the publications themselves, the research published in them and
others, such as College English and College Composition and Communication, establishes
writing centers as sites of academic enquiry. Finally, tutor-training courses are now offered for
credit on many college campuses, indicating that the university has recognized the academic
value of collaborative work.108
Despite, or perhaps because of, these indicators of acceptance by and status in academia,
some within the writing center community, such as Summerfield, are suspicious of the acquired
centrality: I have visited some writing centers of late. Some astonish me. They are plush, with
luxurious carpets, modern (or postmodern) prints on the walls, secretaries, computer terminals,
stocked libraries, spacious surroundings – and cubicles. I say watch out for the cubicles. Watch
out for the computer terminals. Watch out for all evidence of attempts to break down the
gathering of minds.109 Yet, it is this gathering of minds that is the most important aspect in the
development of the writing center. Stemming from historical antecedents that presupposed
conversation, established through a variety of impetuses, encompassing several names and
images, relying on faculty and students to carry out its work collaboratively, and eliciting
conflicting responses from the university, the writing center has remained true to its mission, as
North said, of talking to writers:
If writing centers are going to finally be accepted, surely, they must be accepted on their
own terms, as places whose primary responsibility, …is to talk to writers. That is their heritage,
and it stretches back farther than the 1960s or the early 1970s, or to Iowa in the 1930s [, or St.
Louis in 1904] – back, in fact, to Athens, where in a busy marketplace a tutor called Socrates set
up the same kind of shop: open to all comers, no fees charged, offering, on whatever subject a
visitor might propose, a continuous dialectic that is, finally, its own end.110 This heritage of
conversation is what makes the writing center such a rich and integral part of the university
community today.

ENDNOTES
1. Frederick Rudolph, The American
College & University: A History
(Athens: University of Georgia,1990) ,
332.
2. Joyce A. Kinkead, and Jeanette G
Harris, Writing Centers in Context:
Twelve Case Studies (Urbana, IL:
NCTE, 1993) , iv.
3. Muriel Harris, SLATE (Support for
the Learning and Teaching of English)
Statement: The Concept of a Writing
Center.1988. Available [Online]: <http://
iwca.syr.edu/IWCA/Startup/Slate.htm>
[10 October 2002].
5. Peter Carino, "Early Writing Centers:
Toward a History," The Writing Center
Journal 15, no.2 (1995): 103.
6. Ibid., 103,104.
7. Ibid., 104.
8. Muriel Harris, "What’s up and What’s
in: Trends and Traditions in Writing
Centers," in Landmark Essays on
Writing Centers, ed. Christina Murphy
and Joe Law (Davis, CA: Hermagoras
Press,1995), 27. Rudolph, 138.
9. Ibid., 139.
10. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
33.
11. Stephen North, "The Idea of a
Writing Center," in The Allyn and
Bacon Guide to Writing Center Theory
and Practice, ed. Robert W. Barnett and
Jacob S. Blumner (Boston: Allyn and
Bacon,
2001) , 69.
12. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
31.
13. Rudolph, 137.
14. Elizabeth Boquet, " ‘Our Little
Secret’: A History of Writing Centers,
Pre- to Post-open Admissions," College
Composition and Communication 50,
no.3 (1999): 467.
15. Peggy Jolly, "The Bottom Line:
Financial Responsibility," in Writing
Centers: Theory and Administration, ed.
Gary A. Olsen, (Urbana, IL:
NCTE,1984), 101.
16. Ibid., 102.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Boquet, 467.
22. Carino, "Early Writing Centers,"
105.
23. Boquet, 467.
24. Ibid.
25. Boquet, 467; Carino, "Early Writing
Centers," 106.
26. Carino, "Early Writing Centers,"
106.
27. Ibid., 107.
28. Robert Moore, "The Writing Clinic
and the Writing Laboratory," in The
Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing
Center Theory and Practice, ed. Robert
W. Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner
(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 3.
29. North, 66.
30. Lou Kelly, "One-on-one, Iowa City
Style: Fifty Years of Individualized
Writing Instruction," in Landmark
Essays on Writing Centers, ed. Christina
Murphy and Joe Law, (Davis, CA:
Hermagoras Press,1995), 11.
31. Ibid., 11,12.
32. Ibid., 12.
33. Boquet, 468.
34. Ibid.
35. Muriel Harris, "Growing Pains: The
Coming of Age of Writing Centers," The
Writing Center Journal 2, no. 1(1982).
Available [Online]:
<http://www.wcrp.louisville.edu/
wcj2.1_mharris.htm> [9 September
2002]; Suzanne Powers, "What
Composition Teachers Need to Know
about Writing Centers," Freshmen
English News 19, no.2 (1991): 15.
36. Joyce Kinkead, "The National
Writing Centers Association as Mooring:
A Personal History of the First Decade," 51. Boquet, 465.
in The Allyn and Bacon Guide to 52. Carino, "What Do We Talk about,"
Writing Center Theory and Practice, ed. 105.
Robert W. Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner 53. Ibid.
(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 29-40. 54. Ibid., 106.
37. Boquet, 472. 55. Boquet, 469.
38. William Yahner and Willam 56. Carino, "Early Writing Centers,"
Murdick, "The Evolution of a Writing 107-8.
Center: 1972-1990," The Writing Center 57. Boquet, 470.
Journal 11, no. 2(1991): 16 58. Moore, 4-6.
39. Ibid., 15. 59. Ibid., 6.
40. Harris, "Growing Pains," "SLATE 60. Ibid., 4.
Statement;" Kinkead and Harris, 2 61. Carino, "What Do We Talk about,"
41. John Trimbur, "Theory of Visual 39-40.
Design," in Coming of Age: The 62. Ibid., 41.
Advanced Writing Curriculum. ed. 63. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
Linda K. Shamoon, Rebecca Moore 33.
Howard, Sandra Jamieson, and Robert 64. North, 78. Carino makes this
A. Schwegler, (Upper Montclair, NJ: connection to North.
Boynton Cook), 277; quoted in Rebecca 65. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
Moore Howard, Syllabus CCR 29.
651:Interdisciplinary Studies in 66. Kinkead, 34.
Language and Literacy. Available 67. Kelly, 12.
[Online]: <http://wrt- 68. Carino, "Early Writing Centers,"
howard.syr.edu/Syllabi/CCR651SylS00. 111.
html> [15 November 2002].
69. Ibid.
42. Harris, "Growing Pains."
70. Ibid.
43. Yahner and Murdick, 14.
71. Ibid.
44. Kinkead and Harris, 228-31.
72. Kenneth Bruffee, "Peer Tutoring and
45. Patricia M. Dyer, interview by the ‘Conversation of Mankind,’ " in The
author, Chester, PA, 8 October 2002. Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing
46. Robert W. Barnett and Jacob S. Center Theory and Practice, ed. Robert
Blumner, The Allyn and Bacon Guide to W. Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner
Writing Center Theory and Practice (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 206.
(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 401. 73. Ibid., 206-07.
47. Kinkead and Harris, 228-31. 74. Ibid., 207.
48. Harris, "Growing Pains." 75. Boquet, 474.
49. Boquet, 467; Harris, "Growing 76. Ibid., 475.
Pains."
77. Harris, "SLATE Statement."
50. Peter Carino, "What Do We Talk
78. Andrea Lunsford, "Collaboration,
about When We Talk about Our
Control, and the Idea of a Writing
Metaphors: A Cultural Critique of
Center," in The Allyn and Bacon Guide
Clinic, Lab, and Center," in Landmark
to Writing Center Theory and Practice,
Essays on Writing Centers, ed. Christina
ed. Robert W. Barnett and Jacob S.
Murphy and Joe Law (Davis, CA:
Blumner (Boston: Allyn and Bacon,
Hermagoras Press, 1995), 37.
 2001), 93; Eric H. Hobson, "Maintaining
Our Balance: Walking the Tightrope of
Competing Epistemologies," idem, 105;
Christiana Murphy, "The Writing Center
and Social Constructionist Theory,"
idem, 112; Linda K. Shamoon and
Deborah H. Burns, "A Critique of Pure
Tutoring," idem, 227.
79. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
27.
80. Jolly, 106.
81. Moore, 8.
82. Kinkead and Harris, 228-31.
83. Ibid.
84. Jolly, 103.
85. North, 68.
86. Harris, "Growing Pains."
87. Kinkead, 31.
88. North, 66,67.
89. Ibid.
90. Harris, "What’s up and What’s in,"
20.
91. Moore, 9
92. Ibid.
93. Powers, 18.
94. Ibid., 16.
95. Irene L. Clark and Dave Healy, "Are
Writing Centers Ethical? in The Allyn
and Bacon Guide to Writing Center
Theory and Practice, ed. Robert W.
Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner (Boston:
Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 242.
96. Jeff Brooks, "Minimalist Tutoring:
Making the Student do all the Work," in
The Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing
Center Theory and Practice, ed. Robert
W. Barnett and Jacob S. Blumner
(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001), 219.
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