US Survey

Survey of Programs in Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) and Writing in Disciplines (WID)

Our goals for this portion of the project are the following:

Develop an understanding of the number of existing WAC/WID programs and initiatives in the US and in Canada (2006-08 survey); in the US only (2015- survey).
Explore the components that make up the programs and how those components may differ depending on the unique makeup of the institution and program.
Determine components that may increase the likelihood of program success and sustainability based on institutional characteristics

Researchers

Chris Thaiss—University of California, Davis cjthaiss@ucdavis.edu

Tara Porter—University of California, Davis

Michele Zugnoni—Northwestern University michele.zugnoni@northwestern.edu

Publications and Presentations

Thaiss, Chris, and Tara Porter. “The State of WAC/WID in 2010: Methods and Results of the U.S. Survey of the International WAC/WID Mapping Project.” ‘’College Composition and Communication.’’ 61.3 (2010): 524-70. Web.

International Network of WAC Programs (INWAC) meeting at Conference on College Composition and Communication (New York), March 2007

International "Writing Research Across Borders" Conference (Santa Barbara, California, US), February 2008

Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC)(New Orleans, Louisiana, US), April 2008 (featured presentation given by Tiane Donahue, U. of Maine; Lisa Ganobcsik-Williams, Coventry U.; Terry Myers Zawacki, George Mason U.; Tara Porter, U. of California-Davis; Chris Thaiss, U. of California-Davis, chair)

Ninth International Conference on Writing across the Curriculum (Austin, Texas, US), May 2008

CCCC, San Francisco, March 2009

Canadian Association for the Study of Discourse and Writing (CASDW), Ottawa, May 2009

CCCC, Louisville, KY (U.S.), March 2010

International "Writing Research Across Borders" Conference (Fairfax, VA, US), February 2011

US Council of Writing Program Administrators, Albuquerque, New Mexico, July 2012

International Writing across the Curriculum Conference (IWAC), Ann Arbor, Michigan, June 2016

International "Writing Reseach Across Borders" Conference, Bogota, Colombia, February 2017

International Writing Across the Curriculum (IWAC) Conference, Fort Collins, Colorado, August 2021

Writing Sites Interactive Mapping Project

The Writing Sites project expands on previous interactions of the WAC/WID mapping projects, with the ultimate aim of creating two interactive maps that show writing spaces at diverse institutions. One map will chart WAC programs (formal or informal), and the other will chart writing classes/programs (again, formal or informal).

We hope that these maps will be useful in connecting emergent WPAs/WAC specialists to others in similar positions and/or at similar institutions. We are particularly interested in emphasizing emergent voices that are frequently missing in the published scholarly conversation.

We are currently piloting our survey instruments and hope to send them out widely by late summer/early fall 2021. We will present these plans at the IWAC Conference (virtual) at Colorado State University in August 2021.

Research Team:

Kendon Kurzer, University of California, Davis

Katherine Daily O'Meara, St. Norbert College

Greer Murphy, University of Rochester

Robyn Russo, Northern Virginia Community College