Myth: The writing center is intended for students who are at risk of failing their writing courses or who need "remedial" basic skills development.

Fact: The writing center is designed for students at all levels of experience and ability in writing. We are here to help you discover practices that work for you regardless of your current level of success in your class or assignment or stage in the writing process.

Myth: The best time to begin visiting the writing center is after mid-term time or upon receiving the first low grade of the semester.

Fact: To get the greatest benefit from the writing center, sign up early in the semester and come regularly. One model that works well is to sign up to work with the same tutor for 5 weekly sessions and then evaluate your progress, goals, and writing needs with your tutor at that point.

Myth: If I visit the Writing Center, I’ll be guaranteed a better grade on my paper.

Fact: At the Writing Center, our tutoring sessions focus on targeting specific skills within the context of student papers. During these sessions, tutors practice a hands-off approach which, while offering students experienced guidance, ensures that students retain control over their intellectual property. Inevitably tutors cannot address all possible improvements in a paper in just one or two tutoring sessions, nor are they responsible for how successful a student is in applying what has been learned in the tutoring session.
Students who visit the Writing Center almost always achieve higher grades than they would have without the Center’s help, but the responsibility for the grade a paper receives ultimately rests with the student.

Myth: I can use the writing center to edit my papers and the tutor will correct any typos or sentence-level errors.

Fact: The writing specialists at the writing center will not do any proofreading or editing work without your active participation in the revision process. The tutor will help you to identify and correct your own patterns of error and to guide you in final stage revision strategies, but all of the writing produced in the writing center must be your own.

Myth: Writing sessions often just involve a conversation between the student and the tutor about the student's writing.

Fact: Writing sessions usually begin with a conversation between the tutor and the student, but the main goal of the session is to have the student complete some writing in the session itself. Tutors will often use discussion and ask questions to act as jumping off points for your own writing in response to your instructor's assignment. Your own student writing goals in combination with needs identified by the tutor ultimately direct what is accomplished in each writing session.