By Jamie Bailey
KU offers many resources assist students’ academic success. One notable resource is the Writing Center, located in Old Main 132. The Writing Center accepts students by appointment or by walk-in. They offer 30-minute sessions per student for any kind of writing that they need help with.
“It can be any form of writing from any discipline across the universe,” said Dr. Patricia Pytleski, director of the Writing center. The workers also help review and edit resumes, and they encourage students to come by and get them looked at.
The hours for the Writing Center are typically Monday to Friday during the day, but what most students and faculty are unaware of is that it is also open from 6 to 9 p.m. Monday and Wednesday. Closer to midterms and finals, the center will be expanding its hours to Sundays 6 to 9 p.m. so that they can offer more availability to students.
The Writing Center wants everyone who visits to have a learning experience while they are there. It views each visit as an open discussion and goes through each piece of writing step by step. It does this so that students can take the experience, learn from it and reflect it into their future writing.
Sharayah Bower, graduate student, aims to use her job at the Writing Center to make students more confident writers.
When asked what her favorite part of working with the Writing Center is, she said, “It’s really nice being able to help people feel more confident about their writing and get excited about it to show other people, and that it’s meant to be fun.”
With that in mind, Bower said, “I think people forget about that a lot when they’re working on assignments. That it is up to you to make it fun and if you can get more confident in your writing you’ll have a lot more fun with it.”
A problem the workers at the writing center often run into is students being afraid of getting critiqued on their papers. Bowers and Kim Winters, an undergrad employee at the writing center, attest that even the best of writers need revisions to their pieces of writing.
“It just takes an objective eye to look at the paper,” said Pytleski.
When the writing center is slow, even Bower and Winter ask their coworkers to revise their writing assignments.
As a resource provided by the university, costs of the writing center are included in each student’s tuition. Pytleski believes that that alone should be an incentive to visit the writing center.
“It’s a free service and paid for in their tuition; everyone should take advantage of it,” she said.
Next time you are struggling with a paper, poem or even a resume, consider stopping by the writing center. They are more than happy to help shape the writing of KU students.