‘07 - ‘08
Well, it’s back to the grind in a few days. UNH gets a late start: September 4. But I’m a busy little beaver already. Here’s a detailed view of my upcoming year:
- Dissertation. Obviously, this is job 1. Succinctly, my dissertation focuses on student self-assessment in writing courses. Less succinctly, it focuses on the complex learning theories, accumulated educational histories and pseudohistories, institution-specific demands, constraints, conflicts, fears, stereotypes, methodological quandaries and implementational concerns surrounding a writing teacher’s decision to shift the burden of assessment toward a student, even incrementally. It’ll also discuss the impact of the “digital age”: specifically, the way digital writing has disturbed the definition of who is qualified to evaluate writing, as well as the way such writing influences, intersects with and competes with current definitions of composition and academic writing. I’d like to talk about even less succinctly, but for that to happen, I’d basically just have to insert my prospectus here. Let’s wait until I actually finish writing that.
They say that the best dissertation is a finished one. This might be the case, but perhaps it’s less so for a person who is gearing up for a less-than-traditionally-scholarly post-PhD career, and who will probably use the dissertation process as the primary engine for the majority of his scholarly output (hint: I’m talking about myself here). Although I’ll have a coherent, focused prospectus in a couple of months, I’m likely to spend the next year or so with almost nothing in dissertation format. Instead, it’ll be a bunch of short, scattered snippets and examinations loosely associated with the main topic. The actual print dissertation will be distilled fairly late in the process. Yeah, my committee will give me crap for this—but I’ve decided that, unlike my MA, I’m pretty much going to finish up this degree the way I want to.
Committee: Tom Newkirk (UNH), Bill Condon (Washington State), Elliott Gruner (Plymouth State), Lisa Miller (UNH). Member #5 TBD.
- Research. I’m the Coordinator of Assessment Research Projects for the UNH University Writing Program (yes, that’s right, the CARP). This means I’m responsible for the longitudinal study, Four Years of Writing, which after two years of piloting, finally begins this semester. However, PhD student/phenom Jim Webber is actually administering the study on a day-to-day basis (this year follows UNH-bound high school seniors, and he’s a bit more qualified to talk about high school). My job is to continue promoting the study, as well as pilot assessment research projects that will ride the coattails of the interviewing process that we’ll begin with UNH undergrads in ‘08-’09.
I’ve also strengthened my relationship with the Connors Writing Center, and will be helping them with institutional assessment research. As a side project, I’m helping them pilot scheduling software (hmm… Tutortrac or Accutrack?). Finally, I’m co-leading a yearlong series of teaching workshops for Writing Intensive course faculty organized by the Writing Program and Teaching Excellence Program.