Notes from Census of Writing

http://writingcensus.swarthmore.edu/

Definitions
“the term WPA is meant as a general term for anyone who administers any part of a writing program.”

86% of institutions surveyed (n= 671) answered that they have an official writing program or department.

• Filtered to Master’s level Carnegie classification and between 10K and 19,999K students, it becomes 93%

58% of responding institutions reported that FYC was not part of another writing program or a writing department.

• Filtered (as above) this remains fairly stable with 57%
• 71% of institutions reported that FYC’s institutional home was the English department (79% when filtered as above).

FYC and WPA labor
First-Year Writing Director (FYWD)
 is an explicit position that administers or directs the first-year writing requirement. This does not include a department chair, CAO, or director of writing.” This is different from Director of Writing who oversees “a particular site of writing” often with greater authority and autonomy than a FYWD.

51% of institutions reported that the First-Year Writing Director had primary responsibility for administering the first-year writing requirement.

• Filtered for Carnegie class and size, it becomes 62%
• 80% reported the FYWD’s tenure line was in English; filtered it jumps to 95%

17% reported the Chair of the English Department, had primary oversight for First-year writing program, but this was only 5% when filtered for size and mission.

217/ 272 (79%) of institutions reported that the FYWD reported to the Chair of the English Department.

Major duties (n=267 for FYWD):

• Teach FYC (222/ 83%)
• Serve on Committees (225/ 84%)
• Oversee curriculum development (226/ 84.6%)
• Assess all or some aspects of writing program (213/ 79%)
• Teach courses in department, not FYC (62.9%)
• Schedule writing courses (155/ 58%)
• Plan events (150/ 56.1%)
• Oversee exemption credit (135/ 50.5%)
• Conduct TA training (131/ 49%)
• Train professional staff (118/ 44%)
• Serve as academic advisor (129/ 48%)

59% of institutions responded that others helped administer the FY writing program.
* filtered by Carnegie and size = 49%

269/434 (61.9%) of institutions reported that coordination and/or direction duties were compensated by release time.

• 74/434 (17%) were compensated by additional income
• 72/434 (16.5%) were compensated by both release time and additional income
• Filtered as above, 22/35 (62.8%) institutions compensated with release time.