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Praxis: A Writing Center Journal (20032011) Sections

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Featured Center Take a tour of the Community Writing Center at Salt Lake Community College Name of center: Community Writing Center Institutional affiliation: Salt Lake Community College

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Top Row (L-R): Joanna Sewall, Tiffany Rousculp (Director), Kim Burgess, Kendra Thompson, Stephen Ruffus (Co-founder) Bottom Row (L-R): Andrew Shaw, Tina Groves, Adam Walden, Clint Gardner (SLCC Student Writing Center Director) Missing: Susan Cummings Location: Salt Lake City, Utah Web address: http://www.slcc.edu/wc/community/ Director: Tiffany Rousculp Year opened: 2001 History (briefly): The basic idea for the Community Writing Center emerged during a tennis match. Stephen Ruffus, SLCC’s Writing Program Coordinator, and Stephen Goldsmith, then director of a non-profit neighborhood developer–Artspace, Inc., hit balls across the net and discussed how the college might share in Artspace’s new downtown development: the Bridge. Artspace was planning an entire neighborhood of mixed-income housing that would also house nonprofits, an art gallery, community radio station, a public meeting space and retail restaurants and shops. Together, the two Stephens envisioned a home in the Bridge Projects for community literacy, run by the community college.

That was six years ago. The first step was to build a relationship between the college and Artspace. I was asked to develop a special-studies course through which students could create a newsletter to tell the stories of the

neighborhood’s diverse past, present and future. Seven students started it all, naming the award-winning newsletter Bridges: Building a Neighborhood through Story, collecting stories, and putting out the first issue. Artspace was able to use this newsletter–which has been produced once each semester for the past four and a half years--to raise over $1 million towards their neighborhood-building projects.

Building on this success, I spent the next three summers teaching writing for Artspace’s Institute of Art and Imagination. By doing this, I became part of the Artspace “team” and took the risk of moving fully into a different discourse community. Through this relationship, the CWC became a part of Artspace’s neighborhood, rather than simply a resident. The relationship was sound; as long as the college would support it, the CWC would find a home in the Bridge Projects.

It did, and we opened three years ago. At first, we fumbled through and found ways into the community, but we have since solidified into five separate programming areas: The Center, Individual Assistance, Workshops, Partners, and the DiverseCity Writing Series.

Sponsoring department, school, or organization: Funding provided through the Associate Academic Vice President of Salt Lake Community College. The CWC Director also serves on advisory board of the Writing Program Council, which also includes the English, Developmental Writing, ESL and Communication Departments and the Student Writing Center.

Number of consultations in the last year: Approximately 500 individual consultations Twelve workshops Five Writing Partnerships Forty members of the DiverseCity Writing Series Square footage: 1000 Services offered: Individual Writing Assistance on any kind of writing, both at the CWC and in multiple off-site locations across the valley (libraries, computer centers, etc.).

Writing workshops on a variety of topics for the public and in collaboration with community organizations.

Writing Partners--long term collaborations with community organizations to create sustainable change through writing.

DiverseCity Writing Series: a year-round, multi-group writing and publication program.

The Center: access to word processing and email, a library, and meeting space.

Staff: Director: Full-time English Department faculty member.

Writing assistants: Typically between 5 to 7 part-time, paid staff.

Typically undergraduates, but also community members.

Volunteers: Approximately 20. Mostly community members, some students, and teachers.

Interns: From 1 to 3 student interns from SLCC and our neighbor, the

University of Utah.

Clientele: Nearly 900 community members have used the CWC services over 4000 times.

Education: The largest percentage of our writers have high school degrees/GEDs. The next largest group has bachelor’s degrees. The next, associates degrees. We have worked with some people with only 3rd grade educations and others with PhDs. Common concerns: Resumes, memoirs, poetry, letters to legislators, grantwriting, journalism‌everything.

Money Matters: The annual budget is approximately $140,000/year, hard-line funded by Salt Lake Community College. We have raised nearly $30,000 in grants and donations. We are just beginning an income stream through memberships and workshop fees.

Philosophy: Because writing effectively is a means to improving people's lives, the mission of the SLCC Community Writing Center is to support the writing goals of out-ofschool adults. We fulfill this mission by initiating and developing short and long term writing programs and projects and by collaborating with working alliances to identify ways that our resources can serve the community. The CWC also provides training and opportunities for college students and the general public to contribute to our mission.

We undertake this with the following assumptions about education, writing and community: 1. Quality education should provide alternative and on-going learning opportunities to the communities it serves, and individuals and organizations should be active participants in the education of their communities.

2. Writing effectively supports the ability of individuals and organizations to participate in their communities and to reach personal and professional goals, and writing with advice and response from others is a way to become an effective writer.

3. Successful urban communities have thoughtful conversations about social and economic quality, acceptance of diversity, and peaceful relations, and thoughtful writing for others is one important way to promote these conversations.

Praxis is a project of the Undergraduate Writing Center at the University of Texas at Austin Editor login