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It sounds as if you've got some good advice already, Roberta.   I'll
just add what the situation here is, in case there's anything you can
glean from it.
 
For some time a WAC group of interested faculty has been meeting on
this campus, and supported one another in various efforts to build
writing in the discipline into their particular courses.
Presentations are occasionally given by faculty on their various
activities.  The WAC group is seen (and I think rightly) as the right
bottom-up way to go.  Enough momentum was generated over a few years
that Senate has officially endorsed the idea of implementing WAC.  A
new subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Teaching has been spawned,
rejoicing in the name of WIC for Writing Initiatives Committee, which
is to bring together representatives of the university constituents
who "do writing" -- the WAC group, which continues to meet
informally; the English Department writing programme; the Writing
Resource Centre (under Student Affairs); Continuing Education (where
non-credit courses are located).
 
It is, I think, quite a good structure, basking in Senate approval,
facilitating and co-ordinating communication among the various
interested and committed parties.  You will notice, however, that the
"structure" is promising -- since the committee has not been struck
yet, I can't comment on how it works in practice.   The downside of
the piecemeal approach is that there is no one whose full-time
concern is WAC; development will proceed unevenly when, as happened
this year, most of the WAC group dispersed -- a resignation, a
maternity leave, two sabbaticals, a sessional finished --, and when
the collective energy of faculty has been directed elsewhere by more
immediate needs, such as the government's push to "rationalize" Nova
Scotia's universities. (Announcement of our fate is due in
September.)
 
Cheers,
Susan
 
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Susan Drain                                         902 457 6220
Chair, English Department                           FAX 445 3960
Mount Saint Vincent University
Halifax, NS  B3M 2J6                            [log in to unmask]
Canada              Note change of address from [log in to unmask]
 
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