6th Annual Naylor Workshop for Undergraduate Research in Writing Studies

Considering our goals to situate the Naylor Workshop within the spectrum of undergraduate research nationally, we were fortunate that Dr. Jane Greer accepted our invitation to act as plenary speaker and workshop leader. Her years of work on undergraduate research in our field, as well as her other talents, publications, presentations, and leadership of the CCCC Committee on Undergraduate Research, were huge benefits—as well as her co-editorship of the Naylor Report on Undergraduate Research in Writing Studies, along with Dominic DelliCarpini and Jenn Fishman.

Plenary Address by Dr. Jane Greer
University of Missouri, Kansas City

Jane Greer is a Professor of English and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, where she teaches first- and second-year writing courses as well as courses on the literacy experiences and rhetorical performances of girls and women and on rhetorics of public memory. She also serves as the university's Director of Undergraduate Research and has developed programs that help faculty create and teach entry-level courses to introduce students to undergraduate research. From 2010 to 2015, she edited Young Scholars in Writing: Undergraduate Research in Writing and Rhetoric, and she currently co-chairs the CCCC Committee on Undergraduate Research. She has published about undergraduate research in numerous edited collections as well as in Peitho, CUR Quarterly, Mentoring & Tutoring, and Innovative Higher Education. In 2018, she was named to the inaugural class of Presidential Engagement Fellows for the University of Missouri.

Undergraduate researchers continued to join us from locations around the US and their topics continued to enrich the experience:

Undergraduate Research Participants

Jessica Brown, Marquette University
Courtney Buck, Wittenberg University
Matthew Candelaria, Metropolitan State University of Denver
Meghan Connolly, University of Massachusetts Boston
Veronica Elghazaly, Rider University
Laura Feibush, Juniata College
Nidhi Gandhi, Hofstra University
Jasmine Habbal, American University of Beirut
Lauren  Janikowski, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Ajay Kharkar, UMBC (University of Maryland, Baltimore County)
Eduardo Mabilog, Nevada State College
Hayden McConnell, Elon University
Morgan McGlone-Smith , Salisbury University
Alan Mckenzie, Marymount Manhattan College
Maria Clara Melo, Florida State University
Carmen Renee Morley, Florida State University
Angela Myers, Elon University
Helena  Navarrete, University of Texas of The Permian Basin
Nicholas Neuner, Pace University
Emily Nolan, Wittenberg University
Jill Palmer, Juniata College
Rinn Ramcke, Wittenberg University
Sunaina Randhawa, Marquette University
Jamie Spallino, Wittenberg University
Fisher Stroud, Juniata College
Madison Thibodeau, Immaculata University
Vanessa Tibedo, Florida State University
Kayla Watabu, University of Hawai'i at Mānoa

These talented young researchers brought with them topics and goals that offered a deeper understanding of the trajectory of both the Naylor Workshop and the work of undergraduate research in the field is through the lens of their proposed areas of research. Students proposed a rich, detailed, and thoughtful array of topics, as well as increasingly sophisticated methods of study. Below is just a brief list of these undergraduate researcher’s areas of interest—so don’t fully represent the richness of their thinking. But what it does suggest are the ways that this next generation of scholars is envisioning the discipline—the key questions that they are asking, and the consequential effects it can have:

• Cultural representation in literature and its effect on students of color, using a mixed methods, the focus will be on what it means to be culturally responsive in your teaching, provide sources for effective cultural integration, as well as facilitate the continuing discussion of how we can better serve our students in the 21st century.
  
   
• Finding ways to make education more accessible to individuals that suffer with Anxiety and Depression. Although some universities do offer accommodations to individuals with diagnosed mental illnesses, these accommodations do not always tackle the issues that they experience.
  
   
• When people are diagnosed with terminal illnesses such as multiple sclerosis (MS) or Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), their lives are put on hold. In this research, I want to study the effects that tutoring has on the cognitive reserve of individuals with degenerative illnesses.
  
   
• We are trying to learn about the effectiveness of tutor comments in asynchronous email tutoring.
  
   
• My research studies the effect of prison pedagogy and asks whether inmates become more effective writers as a result of collaborative learning.
  
   
• My research examines the best rhetorical methods and choices for online sexual assault prevention trainings for college students. How effective are current programs based on their intended audience, duration, and information design choices and what is the best rhetorical model for these courses? I aim to discover which rhetorical choices support successful delivery of sexual assault prevention content. From this study, I will provide recommendations for better rhetorical delivery in the future.
  
   
• In my two-part, mixed method study of language and law, I seek to answer the question: how much do attorneys understand and recognize linguistic discrimination in their work in the office and the courtroom? Specifically, a lawyer’s ability to represent their clients is affected by their willingness to listen to and stand up for their clients. Lawyers’ linguistic bias can have significant negative impacts.
  
   
• I am exploring how to negotiate the student’s voice with the voice of the academic community—a community that appears to require the student to abandon their voice to succeed. I want to learn how to reconcile our identities to build alliances between these two communities. Broadly, I also want to investigate how building these alliances apply to the community at large, calling for more research into place-based pedagogy and indigenous practices.
  
   
• Through my independent study research this past semester, I worked to figure out how students and tutors become more comfortable in writing center sessions where the student is navigating through a different dialect, language, or learning style. After using rhetorical listening as a framework to explore comfortability, I am now interested in learning methods to better understand practices in our center and expand research to see what other writing centers are saying about this topic.
  
   
• My research inquiry analyzes how the genre of Hip-Hop has been used as a form of critical pedagogy in classrooms across the world and the ways in which it has become and effective tool for educating and connecting with students of color. With Hip-Hop pedagogy being used more prominently in various fields of academia, my research seeks to uncover how the implementation of Hip-Hop has forced educators and academic institutions to reevaluate not only the methods in which they teach the next generation of student’s but the traditional curriculum they’ve adhered to for so long.
  
   
• I am interested in addressing how writing centers can make writing more accessible, specifically in terms of notions around standard academic English (SAE). There is a disconnect between professors of different disciplines and students in regard to how they define SAE. My research question is: How can writing centers combat the ill-defined rules of SAE, the different expectations teachers have about it and make it more accessible to students?
  
   
• How does children's literacy of everyday writing complicate current definitions of writing? What does children's participation and understanding of everyday writing contribute to current scholarship in rhetorical studies?
  
   
• How is trauma created, cultivated, and passed down through culturally-sustained rituals, and how do rhetorical practices perpetuate trauma and/or provide solutions to addressing trauma? How does that matter in terms of power, influence, and consideration, especially for educators? I want to understand inherited and sustained trauma in a both academic and non-academic sense, as they are intrinsically linked.
  
   
• The two main questions guiding my research are: How does permission and ownership affect the creation and reception of a text? Why does this matter in the greater scheme of meaning making in textuality? Through my research, I am trying to learn how people interact with texts based on their feelings of permission and ownership. For example, one might interact differently with a museum space than their personal bedroom or they might handle a stranger’s family photos with more care and restraint than images of their own family.
  
   
• I will be observing and interviewing a Boston-area company looking for feminist rhetoric and composition in the workplace.
  
   
• What kinds of interventions will prove effective for students in 4th grade with writing anxiety? Are their new methods that have not been taught to help with writing anxiety? Many schools are going to strictly electronic, is there methods that have not been introduced to student that would help them with anxiety in writing prompts.
  
   
• How can video games be used as a tool for social justice? To answer this question, I will be developing a text-based “choose your own adventure” style serious game. In my game, I want to explore issues of racism in the workplace—specifically microaggressions.
  
   
• When comparing writing tutors who received non-course training versus those who received the course training, what is training’s impact on internal confidence in tutoring? By examining the relationship between type of training and confidence, I also hope to learn how writing tutors’ internal confidence is related to perceived tutoring skills, strategies, and abilities.
  
   
• How can writing studies research reduce stigma around suicide and start a discussion about mental health for young adults?
  
   
• I am interested in investigating the rhetorical choices made by equality activists related to the Stonewall riots in 1969. I’m interested in learning about the strategies used by activists and understanding how gay rights rhetorics have changed since that time.
  
   
• What are strategies that writing tutors can use to make ESL students feel more comfortable in writing center sessions to increase the effectiveness of these sessions?
  
   
• How did American women who supported the anti-suffrage effort use rhetorical techniques that are historically considered to be womanly or feminine to reject an increase in women's rights? How is their use of rhetoric reflected in today's society?
  
   
• My question centers around visual rhetoric. How are visuals used in video storytelling to enhance the experience of a viewer or reader? And how much of that experience is dictated by a shared cultural experience?
  
   
• I hope to shed light on the cognitive reasoning of tutors throughout their sessions. There is a gap in writing research that needs to be filled by tutors’ voices; more specifically, we need to consider tutors’ experiences as they navigate their sessions, and I hope to develop my project to fill that gap. My research aims to alleviate that pressure by giving tutors an outlet, and to fill the gap in writing research with tutors’ experience
  
   
• How are women's experiences of identity, gender, sex, assault, and empowerment affected by media and rhetoric? My research aims to examine the ways that college women internalize rhetoric (from media, institutions, government, etc.) about gender and femininity, and how it therefore affects their identity and experiences of gender and sex
  
   
• In my project, I seek to extend this conversation into a cultural rhetorics framework (Powell et al., 2014), beyond the writing classroom, to understand how veterans may better understand emotional consciousness through epistolary, especially related to toxic masculine rhetorics that pervade military culture. Ultimately, I seek to continue developing a project that investigates how veterans write post-service, what they write about, and how they verbalize their emotions in their writing.
  
   
• Although the style of orientations in our writing center is informative, it does not reflect the peer-peer nature of our space. Whereas orientations ask consultants to present themselves as an authority figure, classroom visits ask consultants to have a conversation with students about writing as a peer. The main question I’ve wanted to answer during my research is: What are some effective strategies for communicating the horizontal nature of our space?
  
   
• My research examines several dozen writing center sessions over a ten-year period, noting how often praise was used in each, and how that use related to the type of session (face-to-face or email), the sex of the tutor, and the experience of the tutor.

Writing Studies and Undergraduate Researchers Contributions to Social Justice

What was also evident in the “consequential research” that undergraduate researchers proposed were the ways that they were enacting areas of concern that have long been a mission of our discipline—as well as of the Naylor Endowment and Workshop.  These statements by undergraduate researchers about the consequence of their work illustrate the ways in which the field is moving within this new generation of scholars.

• My research will advance social justice and literacy by bringing to light the importance of having positive images of one’s self portrayed in everyday life—whether that be on TV or in the classroom. By formulating a presentation focused on cultural integration, I will be able to provide valuable information for college students looking to teach very soon, bringing these values of cultural integration and capital into the next generation.
  
   
• Most accessibility centers may offer accommodations to individuals with mental illnesses, but these accommodations don't always cater to the individual needs. For the average individual, receiving additional time to work on an assignment or to take an exam can assist them in their work. However, this may not apply to someone who learns and functions in ways that are different from average person. Individuals with mental health issues could benefit more with additional support from their instructors, which may increase their confidence in the work they produce and the knowledge they retain, or can even motivate them to work harder due to feeling supported by their instructors. Through my research, I hope to promote equal opportunity in the accessibility of education, as well as a potential to allow those students to learn ways to cope with their illnesses in future settings.
  
   
• Patients with terminal diseases, specifically MS and ALS, have not been given the opportunity of educational advancement due to their social label as a “Hopeless Case”. In the eyes of their doctors, family, and society they are just one day closer to death, in which their stand negatively effects the patient to lose hope or motive in life. My research will not only give them access to education, but also will address the effect of education on the longevity of their prognosis; specifically their cognitive reserve.
  
   
• Researchers in the field of prison literacy, like Nagelsen and Donovan find that there is immense benefit in teaching prison writing. As a teacher, Nagelsen states that writing is a way in which prisoners find some freedom. “In their minds, they can anywhere but where they are.” (Nagelsen, 2009, 1). My study aims to create not only future scholars, but pacifist inmates, who will quell violence within their housed correctional facility.
  
   
• The Me Too Movement has called attention to sexual violence and the cultural shift needed to prevent these cases from happening. One of the main issues with communicating about sexual assault prevention is that there isn’t adequate language and rhetorical tactics within American society to talk about sexaul assault--how are you supposed to address sexual assault without having the language or rhetorical methods to talk about it? By utilizing the methods of professional writing studies and starting to develop more vocabulary and communication tactics surrounding sexual assault, we can create adequate mediums to discuss the college sexual assault problem in our country and hopefully bring about social justice with regards to gender violence.
  
   
• As mentioned above, the goal of this research is to figure out if there has been stasis or change in terms of linguistic discrimination in Milwaukee’s legal system. From there, I or others interested in this issue can use this research to identify if change is needed, what that change should look like, and how that change could be taken put into action. It is also my intent that I can bring more awareness of these issues to other law students.
  
   
• Our work would be really helpful in advancing social justice for students with disabilities who are underrepresented here at Marquette particularly because they are largely forgotten in discourses about writing and teaching in writing. We think this research will go a long way in illuminating the fascinating, largely unexplored, and pertinent aspects of disability studies as they relate to or intersect with writing and, more importantly, writers!
  
   
• My research attempts to build alliances that would forward projects on social justice. It aims to inspire a conversation around our identities and understand our fluidity. We do not need to reject others as “different” because they do not match our understanding, since this refusal only causes unnecessary fragmentation and conflict. Rather, I want this research to introduce a space in which differences are welcomed, offering more conversations that tease out the nuances of issues. This type of thinking supports a community that can address larger issues of climate change and homelessness.
  
   
• In the times we live in today, where so many minorities in this country feel marginalized and alienated by society, education and literacy can arm them with the knowledge to combat oppression. For so long, students of color have had to learn about the world through a Eurocentric lens. By the same token, Hip-Hop has always been an African American art form that addresses complex issues in society such as racism, poverty, sexism, and police brutality and forces urban youth culture to challenge the beliefs and practices that have dominated society for generations. It’s undeniable that the young boys and girls of today are our future. I believe that by adding Hip-Hop into the cannon of literature, teachers and academic institutions are preparing their students for the harsh realities they face outside the classroom as well as create a curriculum that reflects their cultural identities.
  
   
• My work advance social justice and literacy because it seeks to examine academic English and the stigmas that are associated with the certain expectations of a standard academic English upon minority groups and multilingual students.
  
   
• The voices of many people have long been silenced and denied literacy, and I believe my work attempts to give voice and validation to children from early on in their writing endeavors so as to decentralize often oppressive Western writing structure and make room for new, diverse forms of writing.
  
   
• America has a tradition of gun violence that won’t be addressed because of “the way things are,” ritual. The rights of people to get abortions are being taken away because of a court process that includes the ability to make decisions about people not even represented in the room, ritual. We see people of color getting disproportionately killed and incarcerated because of racism, ritual. People are hitting their kids who hit their kids who hit their kids, ritual. If we understand the trauma we cause through not changing or evolving or becoming something different than what has hurt others before than substantive changes could be made that would help a lot of people. And if we take trauma more seriously, that might just happen.
  
   
• My work aims to make all students feel more comfortable in the classroom and world of academia. New materialisms seeks to acknowledge all the players involved in textual creation and making students consider how the ink in their pen impacts the words they write makes them think more critically about everything and everyone’s role in the world. This consideration can make students more confident in their ability and importance but also recognize and be more mindful of the work that everything/one is doing.
  
   
• In my freshman and sophomore years, I volunteered with an organization Strong Women Strong Girls. In our mentor sessions with elementary school girls, we taught them about strong women who have broken through societal expectations and impacted their communities and countries. The most important takeaway of these sessions was teaching the girls that they are strong, loud, and proud. With a stronger focus on female empowerment, especially from a young age, our society is becoming aware of and changing expectations of women. This is happening at every stage—with young girls, teenaged women, and adult women. With this comes a stronger emphasis on feminist practices in the workplace—and, thus, feminist writing and communication in the workplace.
  
   
• Students with writing anxiety would do better in school if they were taught what techniques could help them concentrate on writing their best. Techniques may even help with everyday anxieties.
  
   
• My work will help the mission of the Naylor endowment in that it will serve as a tool in order to raise awareness of racist microaggressions in the workplace. Through my research, I also hope to inspire others to utilize alternative forms of media in order to further their own social justice mission.
  
   
• Potentially, students that belong to underserved populations could have a lack of confidence with their abilities in literacy because of language barriers and lack of access to quality education. Therefore, students that belong to underserved populations tend to seek help at the writing center at high rates. However, if a writing tutor does not have the course training necessary to build their own confidence – how can the writing tutor build the confidence within a students that belong to underserved populations? New writing tutors with a lack of internal confidence and perceived skills, strategies, and abilities as a writing tutor will not be able to effectively and efficiently help the students that belong to underserved populations become independent and confident writers.
  
   
• I hope to make a difference in the lives of people who struggle daily with mental health and with my work they will have the courage to ask for help. Also, by getting more information out there I anticipation there will be less stigma surrounding the subject.
  
   
• My work will help advance social justice and literacy to the LGBTQ+ community by showcasing the rhetorical history of the community. It will allow its audience to educate themselves through my research and understand where the community stands today. It will only advocate more progress in the LGBTQ+ community through literacy education and promote equality to all.
  
   
• ESL writers attend the same American universities and complete the same coursework as their native English speaking counterparts. While these students can all write at an academic level, they may be perceived as less educated as their counterparts based solely on their ability to convey their meaning in writing as coherently or fluently as native speakers. The writing center is one of the best resources for these students to learn writing, advancing their literacy and their place as equal academics to the peers, but only if they receive help equal to that of their peers. Since they do face different challenges based on cultural differences and a lack of innate familiarity with the language, strategies to increase tutors' effectiveness in writing center sessions specific to these students will provide a way to provide ESL students the same degree of help which native English speakers receive in the writing center.
  
   
• My work will help advance social justice and literacy by showcasing how women created an effective social movement through their use of rhetoric. While the women this research focuses on are working against the progression of women's rights, their use of women's rhetoric is important to the overall understanding of rhetoric and how it has developed overtime in response to different societal happenings. By having a better understanding of the gendered aspects of rhetoric, specifically in regard to women's issues, advocates for (and against) women's rights will be able to more effectively participate in the discourse.
  
   
• Within my work, I plan to research the role of scopophilia and voyeurism in film, as well as the female gaze and queer gaze. I also plan for my film to have a solely female cast. In media, women are often subjected to a male gaze, as if they were made solely to be looked upon by men. In my film, I would like to take that in a different direction and explore the gaze of the female and queer audience.
  
   
• My method of narrative interviewing gives female participants the opportunity to tell their stories in their own words, which will hopefully allow them to feel agency and control over their experiences. I expect experiences of sexual assault to arise in interviews, and I hope to appropriately acknowledge these (so often not acknowledged) experiences and again, provide the informant agency. I hope to find intersections between race and literacy and figure out a way to academically tie that into my research question or findings.
  
   
• Though my focus is on veteran and gender studies, my emphasis on gender studies allows for this to be applicable to many other communities. In essence, I discuss the ideas of how the veteran community has become a group that is marginalized, and held to tropes created out of the same delusion that isolates them from civilians. I hope that by doing this research veterans will remove themselves from the toxicity of the stoic military persona, and re-engage the emotional self to help categorize their own experiences. Ultimately I hope that veterans will feel that this community is accessible to them.
  
   
• The purpose of making classroom visits conversational is to decentralize the power dynamic of the classroom, and therefore, amplify the voices of the students involved. That is to say, in decentralizing our approach, we are attempting to build a more equitable space that is focused on the experience of all students. In this way, social justice and horizontalism go hand in hand. In creating a space where power is distributed evenly, classroom visits have the potential to empower marginalized voices.

With such a rich set of proposed topics, finding ways to match student’s work with apt mentors—based both on areas of interest and methods—was crucial. Faculty Mentors at the 2019 Workshop provided students with both group mentoring, based on the matches between their areas of research and their facility with specific research methods.  Students were provided with the following descriptions so as to help them find mentors throughout the workshop that could help them to move their work forward:

Whitney Jordan Adams, Clemson University     

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods

Whitney Jordan Adams is the Assistant Director of the Writing Center at Clemson University, in Clemson, South Carolina. Ms. Adams is also a Ph.D. candidate in the Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design (RCID) program, also at Clemson University, in the College of Architecture, Arts, and Humanities. The RCID program offers a cross-cultural, transdisciplinary curriculum with a conceptual emphasis on knowing, doing, and making-or theoretical, practical, and productive approaches to knowledge. Her research interests include the rhetorics and rhetorical construction of the American South, Ethnography, and Anti-Racist Pedagogies. In addition, she holds a Bachelor’s degree in English Language and Literature with a Biological Sciences concentration from the University of South Carolina in Columbia, South Carolina and a Master’s degree in English Language and Literature from the College of Charleston and The Citadel, in Charleston, South Carolina. Ms. Adams has taught English in five foreign countries, and was the recipient of College of Charleston’s Versailles Fellowship in 2012. She spent one year lecturing at the Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ) and researching how the American South was, and is, viewed in France. She is a former graduate teacher of record at Clemson University, and was the co-director of the summer 2015 writing center at the Harbin Institute of Technology in Harbin, China. Ms. Adams has also taught courses for the College of Charleston, Trident Technical College, Ashford University, Southern Wesleyan University, and Clemson University. These classes include first-year writing, Rhetoric and Composition, Literature, Speech Communication and Public Speaking, Interpersonal Communication, and Technical Writing. She has also been published in The Journal of the Kenneth Burke Society, where she responds to Greig Henderson’s "Dialogism Versus Monologism: Burke, Bakhtin, and the Languages of Social Change.”

Maria Assif, University of Toronto         

Methods: Mixed Methods, Public Advocacy or Social Justice

The boundaries between scholarship, teaching and service are quite porous for faculty members working in rhetoric, writing and composition, and I am no exception. Much of what I have been researching for the past twenty years is rooted in my teaching and administrative practices and is inspired by the rich scholarship in composition pedagogy and inclusive education. One sub-field of research I am consistently revisiting is assessment in writing courses, particularly first-year writing courses. In these writing contexts, I tend to use collected qualitative data and conduct quantitative analysis of written comments and interviews to assess formative feedback and students' responses. The goal is to come up with specific recommendations that will  improve the transparency and the accessibility of these assessment criteria."

Rebecca Babcock, University of Texas, Permian Basin   

Methods: Qualitative Research, Research Ethics, matching questions to methods; grounded theory

I have mentored projects on greening writing centers, on teaching with graphic novels, on embedded tutors (writing fellows) in composition courses, on the rhetoric of political discourse, on both humor and dialects in the oil field, on the use of emojis in professional communication, and on the impact of fonts on reading among others. My most recent research that I've been working on is about using the writing about writing approach to teach composition with a special focus on online learning in a dual enrollment setting. I also have books in preparation on theories and methods of writing center research and on stories of boom and bust--both scholarly work and personal narrative--in a petroleum producing area (Permian Basin). Much of my work is meta-research (research about research) and grounded theory. I am also well-versed in linguistics topics like discourse analysis. I have also published and mentored in folk-linguistics which is the linguistic understanding and opinions of regular people.

Hannah Bellwoar, Juniata College

Methods: Qualitative Research, Research Ethics, Case Studies, Using Technology/Digital Humanities Methods

The majority of my research has employed qualitative research methods such as semi-structured interviews, surveys, observations, and text collection to explore a variety of topics including everyday literacies of medicine and health, technical writing in knitting patterns, narrative and identity in video games, and the collaboration, research, and writing practices of faculty and undergraduate students as they compose and publish together. I am particularly drawn to feminist research methodologies and notions of reciprocity between researchers and research participants, through which I am constantly asking myself, how can my research and work with my research participants benefit them at the same time it benefits me and the academic community? A recent example of this is in my current research project where I am observing a geology professor and two undergraduate research students who are researching how to use virtual reality to teach spatial reasoning skills in an intro to geology class. I’ve had the opportunity to learn a lot about my own mentoring practices by observing this group, and I’ve also been able to share my qualitative research knowledge with them as they prepared to submit their project to the IRB.

Elizabeth Boquet, Fairfield University

Methods: Historical research     

I like to write, and I like to talk about writing, and I like to think with others about the conditions that make writing and talking about writing fun and interesting and meaningful. I do most of that work in and through my research and teaching related to writing centers. I think writing centers can and should be connected to the best things that are happening in and around colleges and universities--undergraduate research, community writing, global engagement, peer and career development. My research interests are broad, and my published writing reveals my dedication to linking writing program research to commitments like poetry projects, gun violence prevention, personal wellness and public health.

Cynthia Crimmins, York College of Pennsylvania

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies

My background includes nearly two decades of directing a writing center and other academic support programs, plus eight years of directing faculty development programming. I've also consulted with faculty at dozens of other colleges to help them develop useful programs and practices for learning improvement. Methods for collecting data related to teaching and learning are close observation, artifact analysis, interviews, surveys, and focus groups. I look for correlations and connections among the primary and secondary research and consider how the evidence informs plans to improve student learning.

Matthew Davis, University of Massachusetts, Boston   

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Research Ethics, Case Studies, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies            

My research looks at how students learn to write, how student writers improve, how students transfer what they know to new writing contexts, and how we can more effectively teach students to learn, improve, and transfer. In other words, I study the intersection where student writers, writing pedagogy, and writing curricula converge. I focus on these questions in both print and digital environments, and I usually work collaboratively using qualitative methods. Therefore, my research often uses interviews, surveys and questionnaires, data coding, textual interpretation, and case study methods in mixed method study designs.

Dominic DelliCarpini, York College of Pennsylvania        

Methods: Qualitative Research, Human-Centered Design

Dominic DelliCarpini is the Naylor Endowed Professor of Writing Studies and Dean for York College's Center for Community Engagement. His research and publication focuses on the intersection between writing and civic engagement, citizenship, and social justice concerns. He works regularly with community non-profit and government agencies, and his work focuses on issues of equity.  He is also the Immediate Past President of the Council of Writing Program Administrators, and publishes on the intellectual and physical work of wirting program administration. Most recently, his work has focused on ways that undergraduate research in our field can support the work or students in the field and beyond.

Doug Downs, Montana State University             

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies, Discourse analysis       

My research and teaching focuses are on how we help college students learn and experience writing and rhetoric in response to a culture where these are central to professional and civic life but widely misunderstood in public stories about them. So I study problems like why in our national mindset writing is a basic, fundamental “skill” when it’s actually not, and how we should be teaching *about* writing to resist such misconceptions; or problems like why science as a way of knowing is often distrusted in the U.S., and what it is about how we teach science and rhetoric that lead to misconceptions of them that spur such distrust. I also study how the nature of reading and writing are evolving in the transition from book to screen paradigms. I most often use mixed-methods research approaches including case study, discourse analysis (including rhetorical analysis), survey, and interview.

Andrea Efthymiou, Hoftstra University 

Methods: Qualitative Research, Research Ethics, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies, Ethnographic research methods and/or participant observation      

Dr. Andrea Rosso Efthymiou is an Assistant Professor of Writing Studies & Rhetoric and Director of the Hofstra University Writing Center. Andrea’s work on institutional mission in writing program administration and tutors’ discursive practices has appeared in various edited collections. Andrea has employed ethnographic research methods as a participant observer within writing center spaces, where she took detailed field notes and interviewed participants. Andrea is currently developing a writing center assessment plan to measure the impact of writing center tutors’ extended work beyond sessions; using a survey instrument distributed online, this project gathers quantitative and qualitative data about tutors’ writing center research, conference presentations, and publications to better understand the impact these research experiences have on undergraduate tutors. Andrea regularly mentors tutors' research and accompanies tutors when they present at writing center conferences. Her students frequently publish their work in venues like Young Scholars in Writing: Undergraduate Research in Writing and Rhetoric and The Dangling Modifier. Andrea chaired the 2017 National Conference on Peer Tutoring in Writing (NCPTW) at Hofstra University."

Laura Feibush, Juniata College  

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Case Studies, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies, Discourse analysis (esp. gesture studies), rhetorical analysis, interviewing, ethnographic narrative, working with or generating an archive, conducting audio/visual recordings          

My research uses qualitative and multimodal methods to focus on how students and teachers in scenes of writing instruction (namely classrooms and one-on-one tutorials) show each other that they are listening to each other—and, sometimes, that they are not listening to each other. To do this, I look at aspects of embodiment like hands, eye contact, posture, and even choices about where to sit. In pursuing this research, I have delved deeply into the areas of nonverbal communication, sound, and pedagogy, and my work has included classroom observations, mini-ethnographies, and video recordings of Writing Center appointments. One of my research projects, for example, involved observing embodied elements of Writing Center tutorials taking place remotely through video conferencing software like Skype. What happens if the tutor makes a gesture but the movement falls outside the camera frame, for instance? Through these techniques and areas of focus, my research shows how looking at aspects of sound and embodiment—beyond the usual verbal and textual sites of analysis—can help us develop more inclusive writing instruction and a better understanding of interpersonal dynamics.

Jenn Fishman, Marquette University     

Methods: Mixed Methods, Case Studies, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies, remixing research to present findings in different formats for different audiences.      

Jenn Fishman, Associate Professor of English and Acting Director of the Ott Memorial Writing Center at Marquette University, is in it for the long haul. As a researcher, she's conducted multiple multi-year or longitudinal projects, including the Stanford Study of Writing and Kenyon Writes. She's also the founding editor of the Research Exchange Index (REx), and she has edited special issues of CCC Online (2012), Peitho (Fall/Winter 2015, with Jess Enoch), and Community Literacy Journal (Fall/Winter 2018, with Lauren Rosenberg). Her current projects include Telling Stories: Perspectives on Longitudinal Research with Amy Kimme Hea and The Naylor Report on Undergraduate Research in Writing Studies with Dominic DelliCarpini and Jane Greer. At Marquette, Jenn founded the Writing Innovation Symposium. She also co-chairs the CCCC Committee on Undergraduate Research and serves on the boards of the Coalition for Community Writing and the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition.

Jane Greer, University of Missouri, Kansas City

Methods: Qualitative research, archival research, feminisms

Jane Greer is professor of English and Women's & Gender Studies at U of Missouri, Kansas City, and she serves as UMKC's Director of Undergrad. Research & Creative Scholarship.  From 2008 to 2014, she served as editor of Young Scholars in Writing. Much of Jane's research focuses on the history of women's rhetoric, and she is particularly interested in how voices  from the past can help us understand our current moment as teachers, students, and activists. She has published on Marian Wharton, who taught English at a socialist correspondence school in the early part of the 20th century; on   Myrtle Tenney Booth, a farm woman in West Virginia in the early 20th century who used her autobiography to insist on the value of her work to the community; and on the diary of Pat Huyett, a high school student who wrote extensively about her experiences in English classes in the 1960s.  Jane supplements this historical work with mixed method research (e.g., focus groups, surveys, bibliometrics, content-analysis) about current trends in higher education, including concerns about access to college for students from under-represented groups &  high school/college transitions and about undergraduate research as a high impact educational  practice. Jane's focus as a teacher is on taking students into new spaces, such as archives, museums, and memorials, where they can make their own connections between the past the present.  Her favorite classes to teach include  Women & Rhetoric; Rhetorics of Public Memory; True Lives:  Autobiographical Acts & Artifacts; and Girls & Print Culture.

Alexis Hart, Allegheny College

Methods: Public Advocacy or Social Justice, Veterans and writing             

I have focused much of my research in the last decade on how writing classes, writing centers, and writing practices in general impact student veterans’ transitions to higher education. My co-researcher, Roger Thompson, and I have administered surveys, conducted interviews, done archival research, collected samples of living veterans’ professional and academic writing, and read lots of other scholars’ research. Roger’s and my co-written work has appeared in College Composition and Communication, Composition Forum, and Pedagogy, as well as other journals and edited collections. We have presented at several conferences, as well, including CCCC’s, Veterans in Society, and the Council of College and Military Educators. Along with other members of the CCCC’s Standing Group on Writing with Current, Former, and Future Members of the Military, I have participated in local outreach programs. In addition to my research on student veterans, I have published work on women in the military, writing with XML, and writing centers.

Elizabeth Kleinfeld, Metropolitan State University, Denver        

Elizabeth Kleinfeld is Professor of English and Writing Center Director at Metropolitan State University of Denver. She teaches courses on rhetoric and composition theory and practice, including authorship studies and digital rhetoric. She researches student source use, academic integrity, and ways of teaching and assessing writing that promote inclusivity and social justice. Her pedagogy and research are informed by disability studies, feminism, and social justice theory. She has co-authored a textbook on multimodal and multigenre composition and has published articles on writing center work, digital rhetoric, and student source citation practices.

Travis Kurowski, York College of Pennsylvania  

Methods: Digital publishing, Creative Writing Methods  

Travis Kurowski is the coeditor of Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century and editor of Paper Dreams: Writers and Editors on the American Literary Magazine, which won an Independent Publisher Book Award and a Foreword IndieFab Award. His fiction, poetry, and essays have appeared in Creative Nonfiction, Mississippi Review, Ninth Letter, Little Star, Poets & Writers, TriQuarterly, and elsewhere. Born in Oregon in 1978 and raised near the base of Mt. Hood, he is a graduate of Southern Oregon University and earned his Ph.D from the Center for Writers at the University of Southern Mississippi. Travis leads the literary magazine at York College, the York Review, and is an advocate for social justice issues.

Elaine MacDougall, University of Maryland, Baltimore County  

Methods: Qualitative Research, Public Advocacy or Social Justice, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies  

I have been teaching FIrst-Year Composition for 13 years at both universities and community colleges in the Baltimore, Maryland area, as well as Technical Communication and an Internship in Tutoring Writing course for prospective Writing Center tutors. For the past three years, I have served as Director of the Writing Center at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). My research interests include: mindfulness and writing; trauma and the writing process; the rhetoric of silence and how individuals can develop a voice, which otherwise might be silenced, through their writing; tutor self-efficacy; and creating community through writing via writing retreats, both faculty and student. Additionally, I am starting the Language, Literacy, and Culture Ph.D. program at UMBC during the fall 2019, so I would welcome the opportunity to spend a weekend discussing research ideas and inspirations with undergraduates and colleagues.

Mike Mattison, Wittenberg University  

Methods: Qualitative Research, Quantitative Research, Research Ethics, Writing workshop—how to structure out time for a project          

My experience with writing centers started at Iowa State, when I tutored as part of my graduate contract. From there I helped found the Writing Center at UMass-Amherst, and then directed centers at both Boise State and Wittenberg. The most exciting part of my job is working with the tutors and watching them discover their abilities in talking with writers, and much of my early writing deals with tutor education: how do improv exercises prepare tutors for sessions? Can ethnopoetic notation help us understand what we do in sessions? (We created poems from transcripts.) How does reflective work influence tutors? Recently, I have been collaborating more with the tutors in other research questions: do tutors evolve over time? Or rather, do their strategies change as they become more experienced? What are the most effective types of comments to make in an email session? To answer these questions, the tutors and I use both qualitative and quantitative methods—whatever approach best fits our research goals. 

Laurie McMillan, Pace University           

In terms of content, my areas of study fall into two categories that sometimes overlap: 1) feminist writing and rhetoric and 2) the teaching and learning of writing. More specifically, I’m interested in the way the word “slut” is used in various genres and how it operates within cultural narratives and politics. My research on slut rhetoric will eventually be a book-length study emphasizing pop culture, intersectionality, and sociolinguistic change. Recently, I’ve done research on issues of gender on YouTube and have published on Writing About Writing approaches to teaching. My preferred method is textual analysis (rather than a method such as interview, survey, or ethnographic study, for example). At times I’ve focused on creative texts like books and movies; online texts like social media posts, YouTube videos, and comments; student writing, especially reflective work; and faculty teaching philosophies.

Jessie Moore, Elon University   

Methods: Qualitative Research, Quantitative Research, Mixed Methods, Research Ethics, Public Advocacy or Social Justice, Resources for doing a lit review in writing studies             

Jessie L. Moore is director of the Center for Engaged Learning and professor of English: Professional Writing & Rhetoric at Elon University. Her recent research examines transfer of writing knowledge and practices, multi-institutional research on teaching and learning, and the writing lives of university students and young professionals. She also leads international research projects on “high-impact” educational practices (e.g., undergraduate research, study abroad, internships, etc.) to explore (1) how to do these practices well, (2) how to scale access to these practices to many students, and (3) how students integrate their learning across multiple high impact experiences. To study these topics, she most frequently uses surveys, interviews, and text analysis strategies—often in combination.

Robert Mundy, Pace University

Methods: Qualitative Research 

Robert Mundy is assistant professor of English and writing program director at Pace University. His research focuses on composition theory and pedagogy, masculinity studies, writing center theory and practice, and cultural studies. He is a coeditor of and contributor to Out in the Center: Public Controversies and Private Struggles and coauthor of the forthcoming text Gender, Sexuality and the Cultural Politics of Men’s Identity in the New Millennium: Literacies of Masculinity.

Timothy Oleksiak, University of Massachusetts, Boston

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Case Studies, Rhetorical analysis

I am actively pursuing a research agenda that arises out of a commitment to queer and feminist worldmaking in rhetoric and composition. I situate my work in the emerging sub-field of queer listening in rhetoric and composition. I am interested in how composers use silence and listening during moments of tension and what they my tell us about rhetorical transformation. My research asks two important questions: What might contemporary rhetorical theories tell us about rhetorical transformation and cross-cultural communication? How does queer theory and practice inform or shape listening practices?

Michael Rifenburg, University of North Georgia

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Research Ethics, Case Studies             

For over a decade, I have explored what writing looks like outside of the traditional college classroom. For my first book, I worked with student-athletes at Auburn, Oklahoma, and the University of North Georgia. I focused on how they learned plays for their sport. For my second book, I spent four years working with Army cadets at the University of North Georgia and I studied how they learned common Army genres. I’m finishing up this second book and hope to send off the complete book to my publisher by the time Naylor rolls around in September. In both studies, I tend toward qualitative research approaches where I observe writers and writing, collect artifacts, and conduct semistructed in-person interviews. Currently, I am also working on a large research project with an undergraduate researcher. This research project is focused on curriculum change as my university is asking us to redesign the first-year composition curriculum.

Leigh Ryan, University of Maryland       

Methods: Qualitative Research, Research Ethics, Public Advocacy or Social Justice, Archival Research

As a writing center director, I’ve researched topics related to tutor training and practices and published articles and The Bedford Guide for Writing Tutors. I’ve recently co-authored articles on professionalism in the writing center, and am embarking on a collaborative project surveying former administrators about the influences of their writing center experiences on their later work and/or retirement. For years, I’ve volunteered at Riversdale, a Maryland plantation house, which led me into social justice issues and archival research on the enslaved family of Adam Francis Plummer, 1819-1905. My efforts range from successfully appealing to the US Army to change son Henry Vinton Plummer’s 1894 dishonorable discharge to honorable, to successfully nominating Adam’s wife, Emily Saunders Plummer, to the 2018 Maryland Women’s Hall of Fame. Activities like these bring honor and dignity to former slaves, one way of making reparations for the awfulness of bondage. Finally, at Riversdale, I’ve created exhibits, written brochures, presented lectures, and am developing a permanent exhibit on plantation workers. Always my question is, how does a museum make history, culture, and ways of knowing accessible and understandable to visitors?  And so I work with public memory and African American scholarship, growing fields in composition and rhetoric. 

Patrick Thomas, University of Dayton   

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Case Studies    

My research explores how and why people create content for online social networks. For instance, my earlier research examined how people with chronic illnesses use patient support networks when faced with making treatment decisions. Currently, I'm working on a large-scale study of composing processes on social media. I'm in the middle of the study right now, with the goal of including 100 participants from across the United States. My methods include screen-recorded think-alouds, which participants create for a week while creating, sharing, or commenting on content within their social networks, as well as retrospective interviews about participants' social media literacies and histories. My goals are to use this data to re-evaluate current understandings of writing processes and to build a large corpus of data for other researchers to share and engage in replication studies, which I argue are under-utilized in our field.

Jessi Thomsen, Florida State University

Methods: Qualitative Research, Mixed Methods, Research Ethics, Case Studies, archival methods

Jessi Thomsen is a fourth-year PhD candidate in Rhetoric and Composition at Florida State University. She completed both her MEd in Secondary Teaching and her MA in English in Omaha, Nebraska. Her background in teaching introduced her to qualitative research methods, and her MA thesis triangulated survey data, interviews, and case studies as she looked at student engagement and reflective pedagogy. She has also worked on articles that focus on classroom practices, especially teaching writing through the creation of comics and other visuals. These articles analyze student texts and place them in conversation with classroom observations to better understand the dynamics between students, their writing, and their learning. With the help of Mardi and Janeway—her two golden retrievers—she is beginning her dissertation work, using a mixed methods approach to research at the theoretical and practical intersections of new materialist rhetorics, reflection, and ethical practices.

Megan  Titus, Rider University  

Methods: Qualitative Research, Quantitative Research, Mixed Methods, Case Studies

I'm most interested in learning about the lived experiences of those in our field, and how those experiences impact the way that we approach our work. So for instance, I have looked at how the experiences of graduates students impact their perceptions of writing program administration work, and the impact on teacher practices on students' perceptions of revision. My current research looks at the connections between parenting and teaching pedagogy. I do my research from primarily a mixed methods approach, using quantitative methods like survey and assessment combined with qualitative methods like interviews. I like to cast a wide net when I research, look for trends, and then use qualitative research to help me drill down and get a better understanding of why particular trends exist.

Mike Zerbe, York College of Pennsylvania          

Methods: Quantitative Research, Rhetorical Analysis      

Mike Zerbe is a specialist in the rhetoric of science and has also served as writing program administrator for seven years. His work argues for the importance of scientific literacy and the teaching of scientific discourse for both students and citizens.

The comments on the 2019 workshop demonstrated both the ways that the workshop was successful, and the need to keep iterating the event in ways that keep pace with our students’ growing sophistication as researchers. 

• The poster work session and the poster presentations on Sunday were awesome. The presentations sessions at the end was the best—I was able to give students a lot of suggestions at this time, and they were developing their ideas and ready to share.
  
   
• All of the small group sessions I did with students went very well. I had lots of feedback for them, and they really seemed to get a lot out of this.
  
   
• This workshop is possible because of the care and time and energy you put into it. I really appreciate your care for all of us over the weekend, and your presence is really important to us. I hope to come to Naylor again next year and bring more students.
  
   
• I really value the opening activity of helping folks understand each student project. I wonder if faculty can be included in that. Short, ""Hi, here's what I do."" The bios don't necessarily bring life to faculty. I think including them in this and extending this early morning session would be a good idea.
  
   
• I think the sessions went really well. For the first session, it was a bit clunky trying to figure out what help students needed or what brought them to the ""what"" sessions. I am not sure how if or how to respond to this. It may be that it was my first time at Naylor."
  
   
• The poster presentation feedback I received was the most beneficial and exciting portion of the workshop. After attending, I feel I have a real basis for my research and a network of academic support across institutional lines.
  
   
• Having one on one time was very beneficial for my research project. Working in a group was great but I believe that I got more out of working with just one mentor.
  
   
• I thought the schedule was very effective and allowed me as an undergraduate researcher, both the guidance and the freedom to build my own itinerary. I know that I grew tremendously as a researcher as a result of this this workshop and I am very grateful for the effort and planning that Dominic put into everything. Thank you for making this a wonderful experience, and thank you Mr. Naylor for making this experience possible!
  
   
• I think a place for people to put their social media so we can all connect would be beneficial so we can stay in touch after!
  
   
• My only suggestion would be for more template options for posters and for some more goal setting at the beginning so mentees know what they are looking to improve. I also love the idea of a wait to stay networked after the conference and would love to see that come to fruition.
  
   
• We might need to keep increasing our flexibility and readiness to be good mentors to researchers who do *not* need to revamp their research questions or methods. The students from my U fall in to this category and reported to me getting a great deal out of the workshop, including improved interview questions (for one), new ideas for circulating findings (for one), new confidence speaking about their work (for both), and a new senses of themselves as researchers in our field (for both).
  
   
• In all, listening to my students describe their experience makes me think that we, as mentors, might get together at some point (early) during the workshop to talk about productive strategies for mentoring in the Naylor context, given who researchers are from year to year.
  
   
• It was fascinating being able to see that iterative aspect really in play, and the distance in thinking that many researchers got. I saw a lot of good increases in specificity, greater care in defining terms, and shifts in concept that pointed toward much more feasible research in case after case. That's interesting.
  
   
• I'd be curious to think more about what role the workshop could serve for students who are maybe moving more quickly through their research process or perhaps have stronger (?) mentoring to start with on their campuses.
  
   
• Loved all the table talks, and I liked as a mentor/facilitator that I didn't know until Friday night what I was facilitating. That helped ensure that I didn't prepare a bunch of material that I then ""delivered"" to students.  Instead, we started with what the students wanted to learn.  Maybe for next year, we could do more for students in terms of work on publishing/presenting for students who aren't totally re-thinking their projects.

The 2019 Workshop expanded upon the “just-in-time” sessions developed in 2017, creating two types of small-group workshops that allowed undergraduate researchers to meet with appropriate mentors. This was accomplished through the creation of “What/Why” and “How” Workshops. Designed to facilitate small-group mentoring among undergraduate researchers and faculty, these workshops allowed for time spent with those with similar interests and goals (“What/Why” Workshops) and those interested in specific research methods (“How” workshops).  In this way, the small groups formed a version of “mutual mentoring” that could benefit all involved. Those workshops were described as follows:

“What and Why” (Topic) Workshops: “What and Why” workshops give you the opportunity to talk with other researchers who have similar areas of interest—and in some cases, similar goals. Choose one to attend, or even wander between workshops during the session time.

“How” Topic Workshops: Attend “How” workshops to explore methods of research that can help you to explore your research questions.

YOU CAN CHOOSE 2 to attend (or even wander between them during each session if you’d like).

The Workshop proceeded according to the following schedule:

6th ANNUAL NAYLOR WORKSHOP
FOR UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH IN WRITING STUDIES
September 27–29, 2019
York College of Pennsylvania

Dressing for the Workshop: For the Friday evening reception and dinner, business casual is suggested. For the workshop days (Saturday and Sunday), dress casually—we’ll be doing lots of hands-on work.  Comfortable clothes, shoes, and layers if you’re sensitive to air-conditioning. 

Making the Workshop Time Well Spent: The Naylor Workshop is meant to be interactive and productive.  Done properly, you will leave the workshop with new ideas, new methods to enact, and new friends and colleagues to assist with them. Your goal? To find next steps toward a productive research project. AND. . . . meet as many of the wonderful mentors attending as you can. It’s a great opportunity to meet leaders in the field.

For undergraduate researchers, the experience is designed to be hands-on so that you can leave our days together with a more refined and developed plan for your project.  With that in mind, you should use each session to ask yourself “how might this apply to my project? How does it change my thinking? What new techniques/methodologies can I use to collect information or data?” Make notes at each session on what strikes you as useful to your own work and how you could apply what you learn there.  And try to leave this workshop knowing more about the diverse reasons we do research and the diverse ways in which we do it.

For mentors, this workshop is designed to be an idealized workspace, one in which you often have one-on-one or small group interactions, where you can meet undergraduate researchers where they are.  A place where you can both give them advice and learn from their wonderful new additions to the discipline’s work. This time can also be used to develop some shared projects and a network of researchers.

Working Groups: You have each been assigned to a “working group.” These groups were formed through our best attempts to match you with others that share your areas of interest.  You will check in with this group throughout the workshop to test out ideas and collaborate. Hopefully you’ve interacted already electronically; you’ll have dinner with each other on Friday and meet this group in person during an early session on Saturday.

So, while we have a schedule, we’re o.k. with fluid and messy. We’re writers, after all.

Fluid and messy is how things get done sometimes.

Friday, September 27th

After arriving and getting settled in, feel free to spend some time mingling with others in the hotel lobby or other public spaces at the Wyndham.

Representatives from York College will be there to greet you by about 5:00 or earlier.

Evening Dinner and Program (Crystal Ballroom, Wyndham Garden Inn)

We’ll first have a reception with refreshments, where you can meet other participants and learn about their work, then enjoy dinner together. We’ll also hear our plenary address from Dr. Jane Greer, followed by some conversation. 

5:30: Opening Meet and Greet Reception, Crystal Ballroom, Wyndham Hotel

6:30: Opening Remarks and Dinner

7:15: Plenary Address: Dr. Jane Greer

Greer is the Director of Undergraduate Research & Professor of English and Women’s & Gender Studies, University of Missouri Curators' Distinguished Teaching Professor, University of Missouri, Kansas City

Saturday, September 28th

7:00–7:45 a.m. Breakfast available at the Wyndham—included with room.

8:00 a.m. Shuttle and private cars leave for York College Center for Community Engagement       

8:30–9:45: Community Room: Initial pitches by undergraduate researchers (UGRs). Each UGR will have one minute to name their research question, how they feel it could have an impact on the field and/or their institution, and their initial ideas on methods of research (what you’ve done and/or what you’ll do to get reliable and valid information/data. No pressure, just an informal “here’s what I’m thinking about.”

10:00–10:45: Initial Working Group Meetings: After brief introductions, each researcher will introduce her/his research question to the group; mentors and fellow researchers can offer advice on ways to focus and narrow the question, and to start to consider appropriate methods.

11:00–noon: Session 1: What/Why (topic) workshops    

12:00–1:00: Community Room: Lunch and Presentations about circulation venues for undergraduate research: Young

Scholars in Writing and CCCC poster sessions: Drs. Jessie Moore, Gabe Cutrufello, and Emily Cope

1:15–2:15: Concurrent “How” (Method) Workshops

Each UGR will move to assigned station in breakout rooms to discuss possible methods for their study and gather advice from methods experts.

2:15–2:45: “Re-visioning” and Reflection Period

Each UGR will take some quiet time to make notes and start to refine their topic and method toward designing their final posters. They should bring these revised/developing ideas to their next session.

2:45–3:45: Concurrent “How” (Method) Workshops

Each UGR will move to a second assigned station in breakout rooms to discuss another array of possible methods for their study and gather advice from methods experts.

3:45–4:30: Reflection and Poster Planning

UGRs will move back into their working groups, where they can work individually (and also talk with their mentors) to begin poster planning / sketching prototype of poster that will include topic question, audience, possible impact, and method of research. This will vary according to how far along their research is.

4:30–5:15: Community Room: To end our hard days’ work, we’ll gather as a full group and hear success stories, focusing upon how their topic and methods have been refined throughout the day.                             

5:30: Dinner, The Roost Restaurant in downtown York

7:00: Evening Social Activity: “Manhattan Short Film Festival” at the Appell Centre for the Performing Arts

9:15: Return to Wyndham Hotel: talk, rest, socialize, and get ready for Sunday’s work!

Sunday, September 29th

7:00–7:45 a.m.   Breakfast available at the Wyndham—included with room. (Feel free to meet in working groups if you’d like)

8:00 a.m. Shuttle and private cars leave for York College Center for Community Engagement. BE SURE TO CHECK OUT FIRST and BRING LUGGAGE—shuttles and private cars will leave directly from the workshop site.               

8:30–10:30: UGRs will work individually on their final posters, with assistance as needed from mentors.

At or before 10:30: Electronic file for mini-posters submitted for printing

11:15–12:00: Group 1 Posters: Pitches and Gallery Walk

Noon: Lunch and Group 2 Pitches

1:00: Group 2 Gallery Walk

1:45: Final Gathering and prepare for departure