Philosophy 2.0

WRITING LAB

Dominican undergraduate and graduate students are welcome to seek tutoring support whether you are at the beginning and seeking to brainstorm and develop ideas, clarify a thesis or plan your tentative outline, or at the end and working on a final draft.

The Writing Lab provides tutoring by appointment. We encourage you to request an appointment via WCOnline. If you need additional assistance, please call (708) 524-6783 or visit the Academic Success Center on the first floor of Crown Library in the Learning Commons.

Writing Tutoring Process

Though students do not have to come to the writing lab with a completed draft, when your tutors work with you on a draft, they usually follow this process.

• When looking at a piece, tutors first see whether a student has met the assignment's requirements, i.e. answered the question.
• Second, the tutors attempt to identify a thesis statement and ensuing topic sentences, ensuring flow, order, cohesion, and focus.
• Third, the tutors look at each paragraph, reviewing how it is introduced, how it is divided, how it is organized and structured, and how it works together.
• Fourth, tutors will look at how students incorporate and document research. 
• Finally, tutors will look at sentence-level errors, beginning with the most major (fragments, run-ons, missing words, subject-verb agreement) and working towards the least major (consistency, commas, word choice).

This can be a long process. A half-hour session does not ensure that tutors can cover all areas; therefore, students should make multiple appointments for one assignment.

The Writing Lab Staff

Jennifer Stockdale, Director of Academic Success and Professional Writing Tutor

Bob Greenwald, Professional Writing Tutor

Tim Cook, Professional Writing Tutor

Jeanne Popowits, Professional Writing Tutor

*From the ASC