The Role of a Writing Center in Academic Writing Socialization of Second Language Graduate Students

Abstract

Introduction: The present study aims to investigate second language graduate students’ academic writing socialization in relation to their experiences at writing center in North American higher educational context. The study documents how graduate students are socialized to use academic language in order to participate effectively within their academic communities by employing Weidman, Twale, and Stein’s (2001) framework for Graduate and Professional Student Socialization. Methods: The data is collected through semi-structured interviews with five graduate students who had experience visiting writing center to receive support for their academic writing. The data was analyzed based on the tenets of thematic analysis, which followed an iterative process. Results: It was revealed that second language graduate students’ reasons for visiting the Campus Writing Center included their educational background, field of study, and their first language(s). It was also shown that all participants expected revision on their grammatical errors as well as feedback on global areas such as idea development and organization during their visits. Furthermore, the analysis indicated that the participants gained both positive and negative experiences from the tutoring sessions, while it was found that writing center was not the only resource our participants relied on for the development of their academic writing. Discussion: There are various factors influencing and contributing to second language graduate students’ development of writing socialization within academic community. It is a challenging task for students from other educational and cultural backgrounds to adapt and socialize into new environments, especially in the academic community of higher education. Therefore, the support from writing service and writing development programs/workshops that are tailored to the specific needs of second language graduate students would be one helpful resource to help them go smoothly through the process of second language academic writing socialization. Given that second language graduate students generally benefited from a strong supervision and supportive feedback, and appreciated them as reported in the literature, it is also important to survey international students’ academic enculturation experiences periodically in terms of areas such as writing, speaking and participation in scholarly activities, faculty mentorship and offer feedback-support to overcome issues reported by students. Limitations: The number of participants and the lack of students’ academic text investigation were noted as limitations of the study. It is suggested that further research incorporates various sources of data collection such as tutor’s perspectives and the analysis of participants’ texts. Conclusions: It was concluded that writing center played an important role in academic writing socialization experiences of the participants, and there were various factors influencing and contributing to their academic writing socialization. Overall, it was concluded that the developmental processes into academic writing in second language were non-linear, dynamic, and multimodal.