This symposium brings together a range of scholars to consider what economic forces have driven the development of independent writing programs, and how such programs are susceptible to economic conditions and pressures, perhaps even more so than neighboring disciplines in the humanities. It includes: (1) "Documents of Dissent: Hairston's…

Several years ago, when his college first financed a writing program administrator (WPA) position--reassigned time and a budget to pay adjunct faculty stipends for program development--the author met with all the most senior adjunct faculty. "Without you," he told them, "this effort to build a better writing program won't work. Participation and…

Seattle University has an industrially sponsored, yearlong, senior design program that has been in existence for more than 20 years. Students work in teams of three or four under the guidance of a liaison from the sponsoring agency and a faculty advisor. The students prepare a proposal in the fall quarter detailing their plan and a design report…

In this article, the authors use two sets of terms--"chronos/kairos" and strategy/tactic--to frame the way they tell the story or the "case" of Professional Writing and Rhetoric's (PWR's) developing identity at Elon University. In doing so, they offer to the readers a framework for identity development that is portable across contexts. The authors…

Recounts the process and narrates the steps taken by the English department at Ursinus College, Pennsylvania, in its major renovation of its outdated English curriculum. Describes the working conditions of the department and the newly devised curriculum. (HB)

Considers that the issue behind English department recruitment is not the size of the major but the focus and pertinence of the curriculum, where success is defined by an effective articulation between what a faculty believes it has to offer and what serious, goal-oriented students--the sort wanted in the major in the first place--are looking to…

Describes the author's department goals with three main principles: to build departmental community, to harness rather than dissipate energy, and to address multiple audiences simultaneously. Discusses how she communicates to the college as a whole what the department does well and finds ways in which caring for the department's interests might…

Outlines five stops that can strengthen technical writing courses and programs within departments of English. (HOD)

Honors Phil Smith for his outstanding contribution to the English profession. Notes that as chair of his department, Phil Smith understood the social complexity of the organization he administered, and his example is particularly instructive when it reveals the thoughtfulness with which he addressed the issue of work for all his colleagues. (SG)

Gathers some of Sir Francis Bacon's educational ideas from his various writings and applies them to the five stages of undergraduate professional and technical writing program development: planning, implementation, mission, design and development, staffing, and administration. (SG)

Describes how the English department at Willamette University set out to revise the English curriculum as a participant in the MLA-FIPSE English Programs Curriculum Review Project. Shows how the faculty redesigned the curriculum, and shares three important ideas that might be useful to other departments undertaking similar changes. (HB)

Considers how Phil Smith has given much thought in his own department, and in the national deliberations, to the staffing crisis in English departments, and he has done so with attention to the highest values and to the needs of all, from undergraduate students in the general education courses to part-timers to tenure-track and tenured faculty…

Explores and puts to rest the misconceptions that faculty members from English as well as other disciplines hold about teaching writing. Makes suggestions that may help English teachers who want to establish an institution-wide program of writing gain the cooperation of other departments. (HTH)

Provides findings from a survey of English departments and the move from literature-based majors toward more majors in composition and rhetoric. Reveals substantial changes in English programs from 1987 through fall of 1992, confirming the growth of concentrations and course offerings in composition and rhetoric. (HB)

Tells what has happened the last two years at the University of Louisville's English department. Presents a brief explanation of why the University of Louisville's English department decided to redefine their mission--moving all professorial faculty into first-year composition. Offers some general comments about what the author has learned as a…