“Have you ever been to the writing studio?”
After the typical “hello” and “how are you doing?” greetings, the writing consultants at the Thompson Writing Program (TWP) Writing Studio are trained to ask this question. It allows us to gauge if we need to prime the writer for the appointment or if they already have the routine down-pat. And this is my goal for this article: to describe an appointment at the Writing Studio from the consultant’s perspective (mainly my own but heavily informed by my coworkers).
When you first walk into the studio in Perkins, Bivins, or Lilly, one of us will ask if you have an appointment and if so, who it is with. If you don’t remember who your appointment is with, you’re normal. The majority of writers have forgotten, so we are used to asking your name and checking on the website.
I (and most of the other consultants) ask about how you’re feeling about the paper, what the paper is for, and what writing stage the paper is at (brainstorming, initial thoughts, first draft, middle draft, or final draft). If the paper is for a class or application, we’ll then ask about the deadline and required length. We enjoy working with students on creative or personal pieces, so never worry about scheduling an appointment for a poem or love letter. The only risk is that we might mention you anonymously at our next meeting with comments like “I had the best appointment this week, and if my writer doesn’t get a bazillion matches with their new tinder bio, then I will consider myself an absolute failure.”
When deciding how far from a deadline to schedule an appointment, you should consider that consultants are trained to alter our advice based off when your work is due. For example, if your essay is due that night, we will not mention large-scale revisions. Instead, we will focus on achievable goals such as sentence-level clarity and overall flow. If you want to investigate an overarching writing plan or adherence to the prompt, then you probably want to come in a few days before the deadline. We encourage students to visit the Writing Studio during any stage of the writing process including brainstorming or first-draft.
Each appointment is unique, and there is no way for me to accurately summarize every single one. What is always true is that the appointments are always in your control. If you want to change what you and your consultant are talking about or end the appointment early, do it. If your consultant has gone on a ramble about sentence-level final revisions and being verbs (something I did once), feel free to ask about the overall flow of your essay or other structural components that you were more curious about. We want to ensure that you benefit from the fifty-minute session as much as possible.
Full warning: we are not trained to copyedit. If you just want someone to check your grammar, that’s not our job. We are here to have a conversation with you about your writing. Our goal is to give you an opportunity to discuss your ideas with someone (other than your roommate who you’re worried is bored of Shakespeare’s subtle slamming of toxic masculinity).
To wrap up appointments, we aim to inform you when there’s five minutes left so that you can ask any burning questions. Then we will fill out a form with you that serves as an overview of what we did in the session. If you want anyone to know that you visited the Writing Studio (a professor, for instance, so they at least know you’re trying, or your mom, so she knows you’re taking your studies seriously), we can send that form to them. Most writers opt out of this option, but it’s always there if you would like it.
No two appointments are ever the same in the Writing Studio. One appointment of mine was around 23 minutes long and involved 10 colored pens and a cobweb of ideas that covered an entire page. That student left with a plan for how to structure her essay and a lot of excitement for the connections she made while talking about her research. Another appointment ran for the entire 50 minutes and the student had rewritten sentences all along the margins. That student left with some strategies to rearrange her wording to increase clarity. I had another student who came in with an essay he’d been given a second chance on. I immediately got nervous thinking he would want to work through every single word of the essay until he could convince me to evaluate it as “good” (evaluating how a professor will grade an essay is something we’re supposed to avoid). However, much to my surprise, he soon pushed the essay away and asked for writing and revision tips for his next essay. We talked through his writing process and some ways that he could experiment with it, as well as created a list for what to look for in final edits.
These are all examples of appointments that went well (at least from my perspective). Some appointments are just alright or completely unhelpful. It is always okay to leave if you are not receiving the support you are seeking. Some writers simply don’t connect well with certain consultants. It never hurts to try meeting with someone else.
To schedule an appointment visit https://twp.duke.edu/twp-writing-studio/appointments/appointment. From there, click on “For face to face or synchronous online appointments.” Once you log in, you can schedule an appointment for whenever you’re free. Try to schedule an appointment at least a few days out, especially during busy sessions (application deadlines, midterm sessions, and finals).
If you are interested in becoming a writing consultant, the first step is to take the class Writing 255/ Education 255: Literacy, Writing, Tutoring. Feel free to reach out to eliana.schonberg@duke.edu if you have any questions about this process.
The Writing Studio is a great resource for when you feel like you’ve become lost in your own words. Consultants help you step back and have a conversation about what you want to say. As an English major, I know it can be tempting to shrug off writing assistance because we tend to come into Duke as “strong” writers. There still are times, though, when an essay is just hard. You don’t know where to start or the prompt leaves you baffled. You received feedback on your last essay that you don’t know how to incorporate. You don’t know how to alter a paragraph of oddly and awkwardly worded sentences. At the writing studio, we see all levels of writers, so even if you consider yourself a good writer, don’t fear visiting the studio. Our job is to help the good writers too.
English Department
