In this essay I conduct a Critical Discourse Analysis of the language surrounding the California State University (CSU) Chancellor's Office latest plan to curb remediation, the Early Start program. I consider Early Start in the context of what I argue is the evolution of three major frameworks for Basic Writing in the CSU: the CSU Chancellor's…

Through an examination of literature in the fields of Basic Writing and developmental education, this essay provides some historical perspective and examines the prevalent discourses on the use of computer-mediated technologies in the basic writing classroom. The author uses Bertram Bruce's (1997) framework of various "stances" on…

This article involves an examination of public discourse surrounding "Ayers v. Fordice," one of the most prominent desegregation cases in higher education, in an attempt to explore how such discourse affects our understandings of basic writing programming in the state of Mississippi, but also more globally. Archived local newspaper…

Herrington & Curtis (2000), building on Goldblatt's (1995) idea of the "sponsoring institution," (p. 48) showed students' need for a personal sense of connection with a "sponsoring discourse" when writing in the academy. As Herrington and Curtis, as well as Goldblatt point out, these "sponsoring discourses" often come from outside the academy.…