The Problem Paper

Pictures this, you are sitting in the writing lab and a student comes in with their paper. As you go through this work in progress you become encumbered with problem after problem after problem. What do you do? Either the paper is so out there you just want to tell them to scrap it or you are so offended you just want to wad it up and throw it in their face. Whatever the problem is there is a way to fix it. You just need to know exactly what the problem is first.

As a tutor in the writing center I will encounter many different types of papers from all parts of the university. One session I will be helping an ESL/LEAP student with punctuation errors and the next I will be helping John Doe find his thesis in his ten page History paper. Whatever the task is, I am going to keep in mind that the goal of the writing center and that is to better the writer before the paper.

So if I encounter a problematic paper what I would do would all depend on who is typing a paper and what problem the paper has. Because I know that just one thirty minute session could have a million possibilities. For example when I am tutoring an ESL/LEAP student of course I will give them more leeway than I would a grad student. If this particular paper that the ESL/LEAP student wrote is offensive I will not take any offense. I will not show any discrimination because my job isn’t to tell the student what to write, my job is to show the student how to write. And I will work to improve this writer one step at a time. I will help this student by all means necessary. I will work to guide this student to establish a thesis, fix grammar, organize, or anything else to improve this students writing.
So that pretty much says it all for me.

I can’t wait to start tutoring so I can put myself to the test.