Emma Webster
The Equity Problem in Basic Writing
Overview
A recent issue has risen in scholarship surrounding basic writing, or remedial college composition courses. In the past, a lot of issues with basic writing revolved around structure—stakeholders question whether we should we have complementary labs to go with the course; should we grade on a contract or portfolio basis; what model of instruction works best for our students? However, recently, the debate has taken a turn. Now, scholars wonder if basic writing courses should even exist. There is an ethical dilemma surrounding the inherent bias that instructors have against the stereotypical demographic of lower-income students of color or students whose first language is not English who are most likely to be deemed "in need of remediation" before they can take "real" English courses. I want to explore these harmful biases to determine if they can be ameliorated or if we truly should just do away with basic writing altogether. Using a mixture of scholarly articles that both highlight exactly why basic writing has a racial and socioeconomic bias problem, demonstrate feasible teaching methods that have the potential to assuage this issue (at least in some part), as well as a recent legislative success story from California-area community colleges, I seek to determine whether the systemic issue can be solved at the individual and, perhaps, legislative level, or if basic writing truly has overstayed its welcome and we should instead adopt the philosophy that an admitted student is a qualified student.
Annotated Bibliography
Bizzell, Patricia. “Basic Writing and the Issue of Correctness, or, What to Do With ‘Mixed’ Forms of Academic Discourse.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 19, no. 1, 2000, pp. 4–12. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43739259. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022.
This article will be helpful in framing my argument that basic writing courses as they currently exist promote a presumptuous, white-centric notion of “correctness” toward which “underprepared” students should strive. Bizzell says, in this article, “…I conclude by asserting that to prepare students now for success in school, it may no longer be necessary to inculcate traditional academic discourse. Rather, what is needed is more help for students in experimenting with discourse forms that mix the academic and non-academic, or what I have called ‘hybrid’ forms of academic discourse” (5-6). Bizzell posits this idea of a hybrid academic discourse, but also acknowledges its pitfalls: it assumes that Standard Academic English has simply always been accepted as “correct” for some intangible reason rather than addressing the fact that “…what has remained constant is the privileged social position of whatever currently counts as academic discourse” (6). This article will help me articulate my point that we should either address our sociocultural biases as instructors of basic writing courses and accept the fact that other discourses than Standard Academic English (whatever that happens to entail at any given time) can, in fact, be “correct,” or we must do away with the potentially harmful field of BW altogether.
Castro, Denise. “Accomplishments - Equity Alert: Time to Close the Loopholes in Remedial Education at Community Colleges - The Education Trust.” The Education Trust-West, 4 Oct. 2022, https://west.edtrust.org/accomplishments-loopholes-in-remedial-education-at-community-colleges/.
This webpage from The Education Trust details a recent success in the world of Basic Writing studies at community colleges—specifically in California. This webpage will be helpful for my research because it discusses not only the legislative side of BW and what can be done outside of academia to mitigate the situation, but also the placement aspect of Basic Writing. Certain bills, like AB 1705, clarifies that students at community colleges in California may no longer require students to enroll in remedial courses based on low test scores that would deem them “unprepared.” Also, “The 2022-23 California State Budget provides $64 million to establish the Equitable Placement and Completion Grant Program to support the implementation of equitable placement and completion policies” (Castro, quoting AB 705 Chapter 745, Statutes of 2017). This could mean a step toward more equitable placement—an idea that BW students have longed for since its inception. Often, placement tests are a completely unfair judgment of a student’s skills, especially students of color, lower income status, and multilingual abilities. This webpage gives me some insight about what can possibly be done to mitigate instructor (or, in this case, test scorer) biases in the field of BW.
Elder, C., & Davila, B. (2017). Stretch and Studio Composition Practicum. Composition Studies, 45(2), 167-186.
This article will be useful in helping me analyze my (working) research question, which seeks to explore whether or not there are certain methodologies and modalities of teaching basic writing courses that will quell the issues with inequity that the students typically within the basic writing classroom face as a result of the biases and prejudice of instructors as well as the acceptance of standard English as the preferred form of discourse. This article discusses the stretch and studio models of basic writing as well as the direction given to instructors who will be teaching classes of these models. There’s a lot of language surrounding “making instructors aware” of the linguistic differences that will appear in students’ pieces of writing. However, there is no discussion of real, concrete steps that can be taken to eschew the idea that standard English is the preferred discourse in writing and how to avoid grading students based on a preconceived inability to master the language. This is interesting to me because it makes me wonder whether we truly should do away with BW.
MacDonald, Michael T., and William DeGenaro. “Negotiating a Transcultural Ethos from the Ground Up in a Basic Writing Program.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 36, no. 1, 2017, pp. 25–55. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26547207. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022.
MacDonald and DeGenaro discuss a “pilot” BW course that they taught together at the University of Michigan-Dearborn since 2017. This course worked toward a “transcultural ethos” as a “programmatic stance that affirmatively and actively works to engage with the distinctive markers of global-local language shifts and encourages the negotiation of these shifts among local stakeholders” (28). Among this idea of the transcultural ethos is the encouragement for students in the BW classroom to engage in “code meshing,” or a way to engage with language that “offers agency and performative and reflective opportunities for students through a fairly explicit critique of the ideology of monolingualism” (27). This article will be useful for my research—since my research question seeks to discover whether the racist and classist preconceptions among instructors can be mitigated through certain teaching methodologies or if we should completely do away with BW—this article offers a look into the potential success of the transcultural ethos and code-switching encouragement method. It will help me determine a solution.
Robinson, Heather M. “Writing Center Philosophy and the End of Basic Writing: Motivation at the Site of Remediation and Discovery.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 28, no. 2, 2009, pp. 70–92. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43443882. Accessed 8 Oct. 2022.
Shapiro, Shawna. “Stuck in the Remedial Rut: Confronting Resistance to ESL Curriculum Reform.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 30, no. 2, 2011, pp. 24–52., https://doi.org/10.37514/jbw-j.2011.30.2.03.
Application to Teaching
Assignment Overview
This lesson is adapted from a basic writing course piloted by Michael T. MacDonald and William DeGenaro from the University of Michigan-Dearborn in 2017 (MacDonald, Michael T., and William DeGenaro. “Negotiating a Transcultural Ethos from the Ground Up in a Basic Writing Program.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 36, no. 1, 2017, pp. 25–55. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26547207. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022). In the pursuit to assuage the ongoing systemic issues surrounding instructor biases in the basic writing community, DeGenaro and MacDonald formulated course objectives that sought to teach students the art of code meshing when writing. They asked the students to reflect upon why they chose the certain codes they did when writing. This, however, led to a “fetishization” (38) of POC students’ lived experiences when examining their writing as well as further “Othering” the selected texts that utilized code meshing, thus exacerbating the issue and landing us back at square one.
It is my goal with this assignment to build on MacDonald and DeGenaro’s low-stakes writing assignments in which they ask the students to reflect upon certain texts that use code meshing in the context of their own linguistic and stylistic choices; however, I want to direct this exercise from an affective (which is to say the study of affects) lens.
Learning Objectives
As a result of this exercise, students will:
This assignment will take up a full 50-minute session of a basic writing course meeting.
Required Materials
Students will need:
b. A piece of paper and a pencil
Assignment Description
This assignment is a reader response. Students will read a selection that specifically focuses on an author who refuses to explain certain parts of the linguistic code he uses. For example, at the core of the piece is the idea that he substitutes dingbats (which consists of symbols as opposed to alphanumerical figures) in place of specific feelings or sentiments shared within his familial structure. Students will read the piece and respond to the questions that I have asked. The purpose of the reader response is to engage the students in a community of conversation with peers who may have had different affective reactions or understandings than they did. The questions that I pose are meant to steer the conversation away from evaluating the piece based on the ways in which it is different (which students often conflate with “better” or “worse”) than pieces belonging to the typical literary canon which use Standard Academic English. Instead, these questions center the conversation around visceral response and relation to one’s own experiences rather than evaluative measures, which can serve to Other the text and the author’s choice of linguistic code all over again. The response questions are designed to avoid the pitfalls of MacDonald and DeGenaro’s low-stakes writing exercises in which the marked dialects used by selected authors are called out for their exoticism and utilitarianism of “Othered” experiences for the sake of the marketability of one’s authorial persona.
In-class Assignment Instructions
Overview
A recent issue has risen in scholarship surrounding basic writing, or remedial college composition courses. In the past, a lot of issues with basic writing revolved around structure—stakeholders question whether we should we have complementary labs to go with the course; should we grade on a contract or portfolio basis; what model of instruction works best for our students? However, recently, the debate has taken a turn. Now, scholars wonder if basic writing courses should even exist. There is an ethical dilemma surrounding the inherent bias that instructors have against the stereotypical demographic of lower-income students of color or students whose first language is not English who are most likely to be deemed "in need of remediation" before they can take "real" English courses. I want to explore these harmful biases to determine if they can be ameliorated or if we truly should just do away with basic writing altogether. Using a mixture of scholarly articles that both highlight exactly why basic writing has a racial and socioeconomic bias problem, demonstrate feasible teaching methods that have the potential to assuage this issue (at least in some part), as well as a recent legislative success story from California-area community colleges, I seek to determine whether the systemic issue can be solved at the individual and, perhaps, legislative level, or if basic writing truly has overstayed its welcome and we should instead adopt the philosophy that an admitted student is a qualified student.
Annotated Bibliography
Bizzell, Patricia. “Basic Writing and the Issue of Correctness, or, What to Do With ‘Mixed’ Forms of Academic Discourse.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 19, no. 1, 2000, pp. 4–12. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43739259. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022.
This article will be helpful in framing my argument that basic writing courses as they currently exist promote a presumptuous, white-centric notion of “correctness” toward which “underprepared” students should strive. Bizzell says, in this article, “…I conclude by asserting that to prepare students now for success in school, it may no longer be necessary to inculcate traditional academic discourse. Rather, what is needed is more help for students in experimenting with discourse forms that mix the academic and non-academic, or what I have called ‘hybrid’ forms of academic discourse” (5-6). Bizzell posits this idea of a hybrid academic discourse, but also acknowledges its pitfalls: it assumes that Standard Academic English has simply always been accepted as “correct” for some intangible reason rather than addressing the fact that “…what has remained constant is the privileged social position of whatever currently counts as academic discourse” (6). This article will help me articulate my point that we should either address our sociocultural biases as instructors of basic writing courses and accept the fact that other discourses than Standard Academic English (whatever that happens to entail at any given time) can, in fact, be “correct,” or we must do away with the potentially harmful field of BW altogether.
Castro, Denise. “Accomplishments - Equity Alert: Time to Close the Loopholes in Remedial Education at Community Colleges - The Education Trust.” The Education Trust-West, 4 Oct. 2022, https://west.edtrust.org/accomplishments-loopholes-in-remedial-education-at-community-colleges/.
This webpage from The Education Trust details a recent success in the world of Basic Writing studies at community colleges—specifically in California. This webpage will be helpful for my research because it discusses not only the legislative side of BW and what can be done outside of academia to mitigate the situation, but also the placement aspect of Basic Writing. Certain bills, like AB 1705, clarifies that students at community colleges in California may no longer require students to enroll in remedial courses based on low test scores that would deem them “unprepared.” Also, “The 2022-23 California State Budget provides $64 million to establish the Equitable Placement and Completion Grant Program to support the implementation of equitable placement and completion policies” (Castro, quoting AB 705 Chapter 745, Statutes of 2017). This could mean a step toward more equitable placement—an idea that BW students have longed for since its inception. Often, placement tests are a completely unfair judgment of a student’s skills, especially students of color, lower income status, and multilingual abilities. This webpage gives me some insight about what can possibly be done to mitigate instructor (or, in this case, test scorer) biases in the field of BW.
Elder, C., & Davila, B. (2017). Stretch and Studio Composition Practicum. Composition Studies, 45(2), 167-186.
This article will be useful in helping me analyze my (working) research question, which seeks to explore whether or not there are certain methodologies and modalities of teaching basic writing courses that will quell the issues with inequity that the students typically within the basic writing classroom face as a result of the biases and prejudice of instructors as well as the acceptance of standard English as the preferred form of discourse. This article discusses the stretch and studio models of basic writing as well as the direction given to instructors who will be teaching classes of these models. There’s a lot of language surrounding “making instructors aware” of the linguistic differences that will appear in students’ pieces of writing. However, there is no discussion of real, concrete steps that can be taken to eschew the idea that standard English is the preferred discourse in writing and how to avoid grading students based on a preconceived inability to master the language. This is interesting to me because it makes me wonder whether we truly should do away with BW.
MacDonald, Michael T., and William DeGenaro. “Negotiating a Transcultural Ethos from the Ground Up in a Basic Writing Program.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 36, no. 1, 2017, pp. 25–55. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26547207. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022.
MacDonald and DeGenaro discuss a “pilot” BW course that they taught together at the University of Michigan-Dearborn since 2017. This course worked toward a “transcultural ethos” as a “programmatic stance that affirmatively and actively works to engage with the distinctive markers of global-local language shifts and encourages the negotiation of these shifts among local stakeholders” (28). Among this idea of the transcultural ethos is the encouragement for students in the BW classroom to engage in “code meshing,” or a way to engage with language that “offers agency and performative and reflective opportunities for students through a fairly explicit critique of the ideology of monolingualism” (27). This article will be useful for my research—since my research question seeks to discover whether the racist and classist preconceptions among instructors can be mitigated through certain teaching methodologies or if we should completely do away with BW—this article offers a look into the potential success of the transcultural ethos and code-switching encouragement method. It will help me determine a solution.
Robinson, Heather M. “Writing Center Philosophy and the End of Basic Writing: Motivation at the Site of Remediation and Discovery.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 28, no. 2, 2009, pp. 70–92. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43443882. Accessed 8 Oct. 2022.
Shapiro, Shawna. “Stuck in the Remedial Rut: Confronting Resistance to ESL Curriculum Reform.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 30, no. 2, 2011, pp. 24–52., https://doi.org/10.37514/jbw-j.2011.30.2.03.
Application to Teaching
Assignment Overview
This lesson is adapted from a basic writing course piloted by Michael T. MacDonald and William DeGenaro from the University of Michigan-Dearborn in 2017 (MacDonald, Michael T., and William DeGenaro. “Negotiating a Transcultural Ethos from the Ground Up in a Basic Writing Program.” Journal of Basic Writing, vol. 36, no. 1, 2017, pp. 25–55. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26547207. Accessed 6 Oct. 2022). In the pursuit to assuage the ongoing systemic issues surrounding instructor biases in the basic writing community, DeGenaro and MacDonald formulated course objectives that sought to teach students the art of code meshing when writing. They asked the students to reflect upon why they chose the certain codes they did when writing. This, however, led to a “fetishization” (38) of POC students’ lived experiences when examining their writing as well as further “Othering” the selected texts that utilized code meshing, thus exacerbating the issue and landing us back at square one.
It is my goal with this assignment to build on MacDonald and DeGenaro’s low-stakes writing assignments in which they ask the students to reflect upon certain texts that use code meshing in the context of their own linguistic and stylistic choices; however, I want to direct this exercise from an affective (which is to say the study of affects) lens.
Learning Objectives
As a result of this exercise, students will:
- Gain an understanding of the ways in which their bodies and minds react to a text can, in fact, be a modality of literary criticism
- Understand how literature both feels and is generative of feeling
- Stray away from identifying texts by their difference from ones that use Standard Academic English and instead establish a norming method based on subjective feeling rather than objective quality of the text
- Relate their feelings to a community of varying affects
This assignment will take up a full 50-minute session of a basic writing course meeting.
Required Materials
Students will need:
- A copy of A Primer for the Punctuation of Heart Disease by Jonathan Safran Foer. (I will provide a copy for each student.)
- A device for recording one’s responses to the questions I have posed. This could include:
b. A piece of paper and a pencil
Assignment Description
This assignment is a reader response. Students will read a selection that specifically focuses on an author who refuses to explain certain parts of the linguistic code he uses. For example, at the core of the piece is the idea that he substitutes dingbats (which consists of symbols as opposed to alphanumerical figures) in place of specific feelings or sentiments shared within his familial structure. Students will read the piece and respond to the questions that I have asked. The purpose of the reader response is to engage the students in a community of conversation with peers who may have had different affective reactions or understandings than they did. The questions that I pose are meant to steer the conversation away from evaluating the piece based on the ways in which it is different (which students often conflate with “better” or “worse”) than pieces belonging to the typical literary canon which use Standard Academic English. Instead, these questions center the conversation around visceral response and relation to one’s own experiences rather than evaluative measures, which can serve to Other the text and the author’s choice of linguistic code all over again. The response questions are designed to avoid the pitfalls of MacDonald and DeGenaro’s low-stakes writing exercises in which the marked dialects used by selected authors are called out for their exoticism and utilitarianism of “Othered” experiences for the sake of the marketability of one’s authorial persona.
In-class Assignment Instructions
- Read A Primer for the Punctuation of Heart Disease by Jonathan Safran Foer.
- Respond to the following questions on a separate sheet of paper or Word document:
- Do you respond (physically or mentally) differently to the symbols used? I’m not asking you to evaluate them or to determine if they make sense to you—I want to know how they made you feel about the words being said (or the words not being said.)
- Where, if at all, do you relate to the narrator/author?
- Have you ever felt like your “people”—this being family, friends, partner, members of your community/communities—speak in a language that is special to you?
- How do you think the author/narrator feels about the language that he and his family share?
- What do you think it means that the author doesn’t explain all of the symbols that he uses?
- Why do you think the author uses personal anecdotes to explain some of the symbols that he uses?
- We will now share out our answers.