Abstract

Writing center tutoring is almost universally considered to be beneficial preparation for graduate student instructors (GSIs) of writing, so much so that many programs require writing center experience as part of their GSI training. Despite various similarities between the roles of tutor and teacher, the precise ways in which writing center experience influences GSIs as teachers remain unclear. This IRB-approved, mixed-methods study builds on previous empirical scholarship on transfer between tutoring and teaching to determine how new GSIs with previous writing center experience integrate practices, knowledge, and dispositions developed in the writing center. My findings echo those of previous studies by Wisniewski, Cogie, and Child, demonstrating that GSIs with writing center experience perceive their time spent as tutors to be useful to them as new instructors across a variety of areas. The greatest benefits were seen in areas most closely related to tutoring, such as responding orally to students' writing and emphasizing the writing process over product. All GSI participants of this study placed value on the non-authoritative stance they cultivated as tutors; however, they each seemed somewhat unsure of how to maintain this role in their position as instructors that inherently grants them more authority, particularly when it comes to assigning grades to student writing. Based on the results of this study in the context of previous scholarship, I recommend that writing program administrators work with writing center directors to create a unified philosophy of teaching writing, and that GSI training include more explicit discussions of authority and alternative methods of grading. These interventions can help former tutors transition into their roles as GSIs more smoothly and may also benefit non-tutors by exposing them to principles of writing aligned with writing center theory.

Degree

College and Department

Humanities; English

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