Writing and Students' Engagement*

Courses that Emphasize Writing Of all skills students say they want to strengthen, writing is mentioned three times more than any other. Most know they will be asked to write an enormous amount at college. Most expect this to continue after they graduate. When asked how they work on their writing, students who improve the most describe an intense process. They work with a professor, or with a writing teacher, or with a small study group oi iellow students who meet regularly to critique one another's writing. The longer this work-related engagement lasts, the greater the improvement. Alumni reinforce the special value writing. Robin Worth, as part her doctoral thesis, surveyed alumni from the class 1977, people now in their forties. One her questions was How important is each the following skills in your current work and endeavors?' She then listed twelve skills, such as use quantitative tools and lead and supervise people. More than 90 percent the alumni ranked need to write effectively as a skill they consider of great in their current work. Faculty members agree about the importance writing. When asked what aspect students' growth they would like our research to cover in depth, a large number chose writing. We therefore explored students' wiiting experiences in a survey 365 undergraduates. In a nutshell, the findings confirm that writing plays a pivotal role in the academic lives-and the academic success-of most students. We also asked sixty graduating seniors to offer specific suggestions to faculty members, and to their fellow students: When are undergraduates most receptive to writing instruction? What kinds writing instruction do they consider most helpful? And what kinds do they find least helpful? Writing and Students' Engagement We asked the 365 undergraduates to describe the courses they were currently taking. Three questions in particular yielded revealing answers. First: In relation to your other courses, what is your level total time commitment to this course? second: What level intellectual challenge does this course pose to you? Third: What is your level personal engagement in this course? Interviewers also asked how much writing was required for each course. True, five pages in a history course is not exactly equivalent to five pages in a biology course. But aggregating over dozens classes gives a general picture how students deal with different writing demands. The results are stunning. The relationship between the amount writing for a course and students' level engagement-whether engagement is measured by time spent on the course, or the intellectual challenge it presents, or students' level interest in it-is stronger than the relationship between students' engagement and any other course characteristic. It is stronger than the relation between students' engagement and their impressions oi their professor. It is far stronger than the relationship between level engagement and why a students takes a course (required versus elective; major field versus not in the major field). The simple correlation between the amount writing required in a course and students' overall commitment to it tells a lot about the importance writing. Consider a few key findings. First, courses with more than twenty pages linal-draft writing per semester draw nearly twice as much time as courses with no formal writing assignments (an average eleven hours work per week versus six hours). The more1 writing required, the more time students commit. Second, students relate the intellectual challenge a course to the amount writing it requires. More writing is highly correlated with more intellectual challenge. Third, the impact writing assignments on students' self-reported level engagement is dramatic. Certainly most faculty members want students to engage with their courses: they may want to keep this finding in mind. …