In March, Dr. Judy Casey, in collaboration with Dr. Beth Virtanen, will be presenting a paper entitled “Writing Out Loud in a Bilingual Writing Center: Easier, Harder, Better, Scary, Rude?”at the Writing Centers Association Conference at the University of Oklahoma. This presentation outlines the history of the Arts and Sciences Writing Center with a focus on one particular SLA issue: the advantages and disadvantages of a situation in which students who are required to write in English often need to discuss their work in Spanish. The conference theme, “writing out loud,” addresses the talk of tutors as they go about their work. In our case, where both L1 and L2 are included, the topic is expanded for all writing center professionals who will attend because while they are aware of their growing need to be able to tutor L2 students, the concept of bilingual tutors working with students in their L2 is a new and essentially unexplored area of research. Due to the ever-changing demographic profile of the USA, this topic will soon move from the theoretical to become a reality, much in the same way that ESL teachers who are non-native speakers of English have moved from a marginalized group into the global mainstream.

Leave a Reply