At the CSU Writing Center, we work with students from all disciplines, fields of study, and diverse backgrounds.Writers might be first-generation college students, from racial or ethnic minorities, have disabilities, speak multiple languages, are English language learners, practice different faiths, or are international students who come from over 200 countries.

Since academic writing is typically directed to a particular audience, it can exclude diverse writers who struggle with or do not use standard, academic English. It is not a language form that everyone has access to, and therefore, it can silence the voices of those from non-privileged backgrounds.

Our Values and Actions:

• To be inclusive with the diversity of our student, faculty, and staff population, we strive to help all writers improve in ways that take into account their various educational, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds.

• We respect students' native languages, dialects, pronouns, and perspectives.

• We respect students' concerns regarding how they can and want to express themselves.

• By balancing audience needs with student improvement, we strive to help writers express themselves in their own voices while maintaining ownership and agency over their writing.

• Each semester, consultants participate in training on linguistic justice and diverse student needs, learning how to make the consultation and Writing Center space more inclusive for all kinds of students

International Students and English Language Learners (ELL):

To support our International and ELL student population, Writing Center consultants are trained to identify language pattern errors, offer a variety of grammatical options for writers to choose from, and explain the reasons for these grammatical changes. Writing Center staff strives to provide a safe, inclusive, language accessible space that encourages multilingualism for students learning English. The types of writing help consultants can offer include:

• assisting with academic vocabulary,

• avoiding plagiarism,

• common grammatical structures such as prepositions, articles, and various English sentence structures.

In addition to language awareness, our we strive to meet students’ evolving needs by working with PLACE to understand the core curriculum values taught in the classroom and how we can best approach writing for ELLs in consultations.

The Writing Center’s overall goal is to linguistically and emotionally support CSU’s International and ELL students and help build their confidence when writing papers and understanding assignments in English!

Ways We Help with Grammar:

Because of these concerns and the nature of our educational philosophy, we do not edit or proofread. Editing and proofreading assume that one answer is the correct answer, without taking into account the diversity within the English language.

Instead, in order to help writers become more proficient in expressing themselves, we work to identify patterns of error and provide a variety of solutions for organization, transition, flow, development of content, grammar structures, and more so that writers can apply them across their writing tasks. This improves not only the individual piece of writing that you bring to us, but your language knowledge overall.

Diverse Writing Center Staff:

To further create an ethnically, linguistically, identity diverse space and to meet our diverse student, staff, and faculty writing needs, our Writing Center staff employs: English and non-English majors, graduate students, out-of-state and in-state undergraduates, first-generation, ethnically diverse, disabled, and multilingual students. By experiencing writing through these multiple perspectives, our Writing Center staff is capable of connecting with any client who comes through our doors.

Writing Center Space:

Sometimes, academic and personal pressures can feel overwhelming. The Writing Center offers a welcoming space where individuals can feel seen, heard, and supported. Whether someone stops by to take a breather, enjoy a cup of tea or coffee, or simply talk with a consultant, our staff is always ready to listen with care and empathy.

We strive to foster an environment grounded in respect, comfort, and understanding for all members of our ram community. We recognize that students bring diverse experiences, challenges, and perspectives into the Writing Center, and we honor each of them.

By consciously utilizing more inclusive language practices, we hope to encourage students, faculty, and staff to recognize the inherent bias in accepting only one variety of English.

Read this statement in:

• Spanish
• Japanese