Writing Across the Curriculum
GRW 101: Global Research and Writing Seminar
Essentials of research, writing, and presentation through global perspectives
Being a contemporary citizen requires the ability to consider problems and issues from international and global perspectives. Global Perspectives seminars, a required first-year course, offer students a range of courses that encourage thinking beyond national boundaries.
Seminar topics vary widely and reflect diverse disciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches, but all seminars consider topics best understood from global or multinational perspectives. Topics may include: Global Warming; World Hunger; Emerging Pathogens; History of Dance; Third World Cinema; Ethnobotany; Post-1945 Revolutions in Art; Traveling the World; Enemies, Terror and Paranoia; Nuclear Proliferation; or Post-Colonial Literature.
GRW seminars invite students into the scholarly conversation at Washington College by introducing them to the process of academic writing and research. Thus GRW seminars prepare students to be active participants in upper-level courses and help them develop the research skills needed for upper-level courses and the Senior Capstone Experience.
In the GRW seminar, students will learn to:
- locate and evaluate appropriate source material
- synthesize diverse sources for a specific purpose and audience
- use sources as a means of constructing an argument
- gain familiarity with at least one system of citation
- revise based on self-reflection as well as the feedback of their peers and their professor
- negotiate and adapt to the conventions of research
Writing
Students write frequently in the GRW seminars. Assignments emphasize the research process - exploration, synthesis, analysis, and argumentation. In addition to a formal research essay, assignments may include reaction papers, process journals, summaries, or proposals. To help students develop a critical awareness of their own writing processes and to encourage thoughtful revision, GRW courses may draw on the resources of the Writing Center.
Research
GRW seminars introduce library resources and information literacy and require students to complete at least one assignment that involves extensive use of research skills and resources. Research instruction in GRW seminars in collaboration with reference librarians gives students the basics of academic library research and an overview of the resources available through Miller Library's web page.
Presentation
GRW seminars require students to present their work to the class and include instruction in techniques of effective oral presentation and the use of supporting visual materials such as PowerPoint or digital video.
All students are required to complete ENG 101 in one semester of the first year and GRW 101 in the other semester. Both courses are offered fall and spring. Neither course counts toward distribution requirements. Transfer students with more than 29 college credits may be exempted from GRW 101.
Guidelines for Faculty
Global Perspectives: Research and Writing Seminars
This course is designed to prepare students to be active participants in upper-level courses and to begin to develop the research skills needed for upper-level courses and the Senior Capstone Experience. The program was designed by the faculty as a whole over several years of discussion and debate, and was inaugurated in Fall 2009. The course design approved by the faculty requires several components to be integrated into each version of the course, and is supervised by a faculty director for the program working with the Curriculum Committee to insure that these components are in fact offered in the spirit in which they were intended. The inaugural faculty director, serving a three-year term, is Prof. Andrew Oros (Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies). Prof. Michele Volansky (Associate Professor of Drama) served as Acting Director of the program in Fall 2010.
** Courses taught in the GRW program must be approved by the Curriculum Committee using a special course proposal form due by the Advising Day of the semester prior to the semester in which the course will be taught. Courses need only be approved once through this process. In addition, syllabi for GRW courses must be submitted to the faculty director of GRW program at the beginning of the semester in which the course is offered, including courses where syllabi were submitted in previous semesters.
The faculty director of GRW maintains a GRW Blackboard site for GRW instructors and support staff that includes a discussion board and a number of electronic documents and handouts, including the GRW course proposal form. Any interested faculty are welcome to submit their email address to join the site. In addition, two notebooks that include all previous GRW syllabi, sample handouts, and other supplemental materials are housed in the Writing Center for any faculty member to review.
Five required components of all GRW courses:
Global Component
Topics for GRW seminars should be international or global in character. That means that they should not focus primarily on American issues and texts. But it also means that topics should not normally be focused on a single foreign country. Ideally, topics will allow for the consideration of different nations, cultures or regions within the course, or they may address an issue that is global in nature and thus manifests itself differently in different locations (colonialism, global warming, spread of diseases, poverty, etc.).
Writing Component
GRW courses offer students frequent opportunities to write. Assignments emphasize the process of research, a process that involves exploration, synthesis, analysis, and argumentation. In addition to a formal research essay, assignments may include reaction papers, process journals, summaries, or proposals.
As a means of helping students develop a critical awareness of their own writing processes and encouraging thoughtful revision, GRW courses may draw on the resources provided by the Writing Center. Collaboration with the Center can occur in a variety of ways—through in-class workshops, peer review, small group writing sessions, or individual writing conferences. By receiving additional individualized support and feedback, students will grow as writers and develop the habits of mind necessary to participate in the academic community.
The Writing Center will also support GRW faculty in the teaching of writing through workshops and individual consultation on topics ranging from assignment design to alternative methods of evaluating writing.
Research Component
GRW courses will require students to demonstrate the research process in at least one assignment that involves extensive use of research skills and resources.
Library Component
The syllabus will indicate a specific number of library-based assignments that will provide students with the opportunity to develop research skills. On the GRW course proposal form, instructors will indicate whether they will utilize the instructional librarians to offer instruction on the use of the library or whether they will offer such instruction on their own.
Research instruction in GRW seminars in collaboration with reference librarians will provide students with the basics of academic library research and an overview of the resources available through the library's web page. The course will include instruction on the information gathering process, how to search the on-line catalog, and how and where to locate materials within Miller Library or on the web page. Students will be required to use advanced search techniques to identify, select, retrieve, and evaluate information available in libraries, on the web page, and the Internet. In particular, students will learn how to use periodical databases and indexes.
Presentation Component
GRW courses will require students to present their work to the class and should thus include instruction in the techniques of effective oral presentation and the use of supporting visual materials such as PowerPoint or digital video.