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I agree with what Doug said about writing needing an "academic" base. He also brought up another important point-- >A third alternative is to have [writing] directly supported as a >separate academic unit under, say, the Vice-President Academic, or >perhaps as in our case an interdisciplinary faculty. At U of Winnipeg, people who have been here a lot longer than I have have ensured that our writing program is supported strongly by the Dean's office. We've now received approval from the Senate to become an autonomous Centre for Academic Writing. This means we're no longer within the English dept., but now report directly to the Dean's office, just as a department would. One advantage of this relates directly to the WAC discussion--while frequently linking with other disciplines and departments, writing will increasingly (we hope!) be perceived as a discipline in and of itself. >At the University of Lethbridge, the writing centre is now under >"ancilliary services," which gives them exactly the same academic status >as the parking office. Not good. Scary! Of course, if beady-eyed government fund-slashers have their way, we might all end up selling parking tickets. . . Best, Amanda Amanda Goldrick-Jones . . . University of Winnipeg Manitoba, CANADA . . . [log in to unmask] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three- fourths theatre." Gail Godwin ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~