This article describes the results of a survey of community college instructors who were asked about the writing they assign in non-English courses. The 171 respondents, representing 140 colleges, identified the kinds of writing they assign and the challenges that come with assigning writing. These challenges included finding time to grade…

Writing proficiency has become a common student learning outcome at all types of higher education institutions across the United States. However, despite the consistent popularity of Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) over the last few decades, most two-year institutions still have no formalized WAC program or training, and programs that are…

Writing, a critical pedagogical tool, cultivates student learning and fosters deeper understanding of the material. When frequent, low-stakes (informal) writing activities help students write more freely, engage with the material and thus become active learners. Looking at students who are at opposite ends of a community college spectrum, this…

Students often enter community college with little proficiency in writing. The authors of this paper share a series of writing assignments designed to help students develop writing and critical thinking abilities throughout their community college experience. The first is a series of relatively low-stakes exercises aimed at helping beginning…

This article describes a study of how students use first person pronouns in papers written for undergraduate courses in multiple disciplines. If prompted, students imitate some of the ways experts use first person to establish their authority; but just as often students use first person pronouns to express uncertainty or to reveal that they have…

This note offers suggestions for using microthemes in diverse classes across the curriculum. Microthemes are short essays (100 to 250 words) that can be used in any class to address any issue. They are so versatile that Ray Smith has called them the "Swiss Army knife of writing assignments" (1) because they have so many applications: they can be…

Increasingly community colleges are challenged to improve the basic skills in reading, writing, speaking and listening their students need for success in the business world and for transfer to a senior college. One attempt to meet the challenge has been to incorporate more writing assignments into classrooms across all disciplines. Concurrent with…