What to Expect When You Visit the UWC

Writing Consultation Expectations

What are writing consultations?

Writing consultations are one-to-one 25 minute sessions.  During a consultation a student and the writing tutor will meet to focus on one specific writing task, e.g. an assigned essay or a research project. 

What kind of tasks can I work on at a writing consultation?

Any writing task from a course or academic project here at the Business School is appropriate for a writing consultation. 

What should I bring to a writing consultation?

In order to make the consultation more constructive, students should bring the description of the writing task (the assignment sheet itself or notes from the project advisor) plus any work completed up to that point - even if it’s only notes on a cafeteria napkin. 
If you make an appointment ahead of time with a specific tutor, email the work ahead of time.  It will make the meeting more productive.

What should I expect from a writing consultation?

Consultation sessions can focus on a wide range of student needs.  There are many obstacles scattered along the path of completing a piece of quality academic writing, and the UWC is there to help students navigate that path. One student may have just started a writing task and not know how to begin, while another student may have a near-complete draft of an essay and would like a tutor to review the essay before the final revision.  The UWC can help in these and many other cases.

In the consultations, the writing tutor will look at where a student’s work is “now” and advise the student on what steps to take next. 

How many consultations should I sign up for?

While students can only sign-up for one consultation session a week for any given writing task, students are encouraged to schedule multiple consultations for long-term projects.  If you have a month to prepare an essay, you should plan at least two consultations.  The act of scholarly writing takes place over time, and the demands of an essay during the initial stages of writing are very different from those near the final draft.

What will we work on in a consultation?

The focus of each consultation is on improving the composition a writing assignment, e.g. finding and citing appropriate scholarly sources, clarifying arguments, improving the connections between related ideas, paragraphing, putting clear emphasis on how premises support the writer’s conclusions, etc. 

Wow! This is great.  Is there anything the UWC can't do?

UWC writing tutors will not serve as proofreaders. 

While a writing tutor may point out a student’s repeated grammar or spelling mistakes, grammar is not the focus of a UWC consultation.  It is a student’s responsibility to produce grammatically correct sentences for the final draft of any academic essay.  Proofreading may be a difficult task, but it can only be improved through practice at the individual level.