THE LONG AND WINDING ROAD ..

Cilla Nel

February 2008

INTRODUCTION ..

• A recent study has revealed that more than half the student population in South African HEIs are over the age of 23 (CEPD, 2005)

• significant number being postgraduate students wanting to upgrade their qualifications (Duke & Jones, 2005:15)

BUT

• There seems to be “no place for them to flourish”

(Osman & Castle, 2006: 516)

THE CONTEXT ..

• The UJ Faculty of Education began a writing support centre in 2002 with the purpose of supporting postgraduates (Education Master’s and Doctoral students) through the research process.

• Postgraduate writing support now operates under the umbrella of the Centre for Education Practice Research.

THE GOALS ..

• To support postgraduates through the writing process

BUT, also

• To make better writers, not just better writing (Stephen North, 1984)

THE PHILOSOPHY

Writing is a SOCIAL PROCESS of discovery and can be facilitated by tutoring which is

• contextual• individualized • collaborative• interpersonal (Murphy & Sherwood, 2003)

Thrown into the deep end ..

Bruffee (1987) has stated that …

• tutors are not just selected and thrown into the practice of tutoring with little or no guidance …

This research revealed that ..

• A peer tutor

through conversation, creates and develops

a community where students

can collaborate and co-construct

knowledge

Recommendations

The development of

• an equilateral triangle between peer tutors, students and supervisors

• a postgraduate programme

The postgraduate programme

• A Methodology course run by supervisors

• A Methodology CD with references

• Postgraduate writing support programme which focused on many aspects of the writing and research process run by the writing centre

I needed to get

WRITE TO THE CENTRE

THE PILOT STUDY

• A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE – to develop a theoretical framework a lens through which to view my practice

• A QUALITATIVE RESEARCH APPROACH – a quest for understanding the postgraduate experience

• PARTICIPANTS - Education postgraduate students 14 postgraduates men and women 8 English 1st language speakers others Afrikaans and African 1st language speakers

• DATA COLLECTION TOOLS - Individual conversations and the completion of a sentence

Postgraduate study is like..

• A very long journey• A f**** lonely journey• An incredible journey • A long turbulent flight• Going to the gym• Rowing against a rapidly flowing river• Climbing a mountain • A journey of self discovery• An unfolding of self• An awakening of part of me that I didn’t know existed• A metamorphosis

My interpretation ..

• Unpacking and understanding these similes led me to consider that the students needed more assistance and support as they undertook their research journey.

• This included emotional and psychological support in addition to writing support.

• It was part of the role of the writing centre to create a

“safe house” (Papay, 2002) and

“a rehearsal space” (Van Rensburg, 2004)

The first lesson …..

• A writing centre should not only be seen as a

physical space

• but should be conceived of primarily as a

‘pedagogical concept’

(Clark, online)

Develop a network …

• with the writing centre being the pivot

• Students are introduced to each other and encouraged to talk and work together

• Conversation and collaboration can occur in any context

The second lesson ..

There needs to be a shift of power.Postgraduate students need :• to become empowered• to take control over their own studies• to be encouraged to take on the roles of teaching teaching

and tutoring each other and tutoring each other and thus

• transform change from below rather than hierarchically from above (Nichols, 1998:92).

Working on own and with peers

At postgraduate level

• We need to build a community of practice (Wenger,1999)

• encourage individual and group work sessions, workshops, buzz sessions, a multitude of possible interventions …..

During the course of the year we built up a postgraduate community …

Workshops …

Within our community, we ..

CONVERSE

COMMUNICATE COLLABORATE

CRITICIZE CONSTRUCT

CREATE COMPOSE

sometimes CRY

With a little TLC and

coffee and cookies

The third lesson ..

is understanding that this postgraduate community is vital

to allow students to flourish so that postgraduate study is seen as

“a dynamic process and a journey of growth and empowerment”

(Bailey, 2001:7 cited in Lessing & Lessing, 2004:74)

And so, the way forward …

• Build, develop and maintain networks

• Continue to develop this community of practice

and

• Develop an online writing centre which hopefully will encourage time-pressed students as well as geographically distanced students to enter the community

That’s all folks!

Bibliography

• Bailey, 2001:7 cited in Lessing & Lessing, 2004:74• Bruffee, K.A. (1987). The Art of Collaborative Learning: Making the Most of

Knowledgeable Peers. in Change. 19: 42-47.• Clark, I. The writing manual from Montreat College

http//www.writingcentres.org/ptlinks.htm accessed 12/02/2005• CEPD (2005) Equity access and success in higher education for adult

learners and workers. Research report commissioned by the Council on Higher Education. Johannesburg: Centre for Education Policy Development.

• Duke C. and Jones, B. (2005). South African universities, new develop- ments and the adult population. In International comparators of widening participation to and through higher education – policy and practice.

• Lessing, N. and Lessing, A.C. The Supervision of Research for Dissertations and Theses In Acta Commercii (2004) Volume 4

• Murphy, C. and Sherwood, S. (2003). The St. Martin’s Sourcebook for Writing tutors, 2nd Edition. New York: St. Martin’s.

• Nichols, P. A Snowball in Africa with a Chance of Flourishing : Writing Centres as Shifters of Power in a South African University In Current Writing (1998) 10 (2) pp.

• North, S. (1984) The Idea of a Writing Center. In College English 46 pp. 433-46

• Osman, R and Castle, J. (2006) Making space for adult learners in higher education in the South African Journal for Higher Education. (4) p. 515-527.

• Papay, T.W. (2002) Collaborating with a Difference: How a South African Writing Center brings Comfort to the Contact Zone in The Writing Center Journal. 23 (1) Winter 2002

• Wenger, E. (1999). Communities of Practice, Learning, Meaning and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press