ENG-335 Community Writing
Each of us is a member of a variety of communities (neighborhood, workplace, house of worship, team, town, state, country, world, just to name a few). We navigate these communities daily: transitioning between them and often defining ourselves by them. Writing gives all of us an opportunity to extend audience outside of the traditional and sometimes constricting academic context. Community Writing promotes citizenship. The course is theme based depending on the instructor's preference (themes might include economic inequality, race, gender, the local food revolution, climate change, human suffering, immigration, homelessness, prisons, etc.). Over the course of the semester, students will read the perspectives of a variety of thinkers (social scientists, biologists, educational theorists, journalists, citizens, etc.). Texts will be in an anthology or posted in the E-Companion shell for the course. The class will assume a workshop format with in-class discussion and regular reading and writing assignments outside of the classroom. Students will keep a weekly journal. A unique element to the course is that it integrates service-learning which focuses specifically on having students write and do research for a non-profit organization. The class will be paired with a local non-profit or governmental organization that connects to the instructor's theme. This agency will need writers to complete a variety of writing tasks, possibly including newsletter articles, press releases, interviews, profiles, histories, reports, fact sheets, reviews, grant proposals, and various kinds of writing for organizations' web sites. A Community Writing class will work with one agency based (to the extent possible) on students' preferences. In the event that an agency cannot be identified in due time, the professor will use an on-campus internal agency (ex. Older is Better, Campus Ministry, Student Affairs, etc) as the non-profit organization. The writing that students ultimately