Director

1984 - 1997

The idea to open a Writing Centre came from the Junior Division office.  Keith Winter, the then Director of Junior Division, asked me if I wanted to start a Writing Centre.   

Thankfully, the internet had just sprung into life and there were “listservs” one could access from the QEII library on dial-up.  One of the listservs was dedicated to Writing Centres.  It was a lifeline.  I found an entire community of people all talking about student writing and writing centres. Finding that group, and the alternatives to teaching writing they espoused, changed everything for me.  I threw overboard what I thought I knew about teaching. I started to learn about learning.  In order to teach one must understand something about how people learn.  I began to listen to the students who came for help.  I learned how to guide, not teach, and then helped them find their ‘voice’ in their writing.

Because the Writing Centre’s funding came from Junior Division, we did not have to focus on one department.  We were able to serve students across the university in all fields and we also served graduate students.  The idea of peer-to-peer tutoring was new then, but it turned out to be both cost-effective and successful.  Students understood the trauma of writing and, once trained, could help other students.  Plus, everyone working in the Writing Centre became a better writer.  We listened to the guidance we gave and applied it to our own work.

There were no low spots in my eight years in the Centre. I met countless students who put  great effort into becoming better writers. It was the students who gave me courage to go back to school myself.  

We fought some battles and had both victories and defeats, but the Centre continued to serve students so it was always a story with a good ending.

Director

1997 - 2018

My 21 years at the Writing Centre brought me several kinds of joy. There was the joy of working directly with students and seeing a light come on, as they came to some new realization about the text they were working on. But there was also the joy of meeting and working with the tutors, who came from many disciplines but learned to work together and form friendships while growing themselves as writers and as educators. I was truly blessed to end my own career as an educator by working at the Writing Centre.

Manager

2019 - Present

The Writing Centre is truly a rewarding place to work.  Our tutors genuinely enjoy working with students, creating an environment where learning is both supportive and engaging.  It’s inspiring to see students leave their sessions with greater confidence and enthusiasm

1984 Peer Tutor

I do remember the indefatigable enthusiasm and dedication of Kathy McManus who brought everyone and everything together. As an undergraduate, I had no concept of the immense administrative groundwork Kathy laid to get the Centre off the ground, but I was certainly able to feel Kathy`s contagious good-will, her determination to make an important difference in students’ academic experience by building skills.

1984 Peer Tutor

In 1984, the Writing Centre was brand-new, spacious and brightly lit, and very quickly got to work. Students came by with their essays in all stages of completion. The most rewarding were those who popped in as soon as the essay was assigned and we could help them through all the stages of writing from research, brainstorming, issue identification (what do you want to say?), introduction, argument and drawing it all up into a neat conclusion. The Writing Centre made clearer thinkers of us all!

1987 Peer Tutor

I was the first undergraduate student hired as a peer tutor.

My primary recollection from my time… is how often we were able to make a real difference with students. By giving them [students] our care and one-on-one attention, we helped countless students improve their grasp of writing fundamentals and restore their belief in their own talents and capacities.

All the credit goes to Kathy McManus and her successors, for having a vision of how peer assistance could help students with their written communication, and the skill to bring that vision into an ongoing reality. My very best wishes for the next 40 years!

1984 Peer Tutor

Kathy McManus was the Director at the time, and I learned so much about collaborative learning from her. My experience at the writing center significantly informed my pedagogy and approach to learning, whether in a traditional classroom, a community-engaged learning context, or my group study program where I travel and teach a group of students abroad.

I remember when I first started, I was terrified that I wouldn’t know how to help anyone with their writing, as I was not a strong writer myself. However, Kathy’s emphasis on collaborative learning, asking good guiding questions, and helping students unearth their authentic voices meant I didn’t have to be a writing expert. We weren’t there to simply grammar check or edit documents; we were there to help students brainstorm assignment topics, organize their thoughts into a coherent essay format, and listen to them as they worked through putting their thoughts and ideas into words. I still approach helping students in this way – as a guide, not an expert, in their learning journeys.

My years as an undergraduate peer tutor prompted me to pursue a graduate degree in composition/rhetoric, a field I had never heard of before accepting the position. The Writing Centre's influence on my professional life was the subject of my recent publication in Praxis: A Writing Center Journal, and I’m proud to say that the pedagogy and ethos of the Writing Centre continue to influence both my teaching and research. 

I worked at the Writing Centre from 2008-2012, for the last two years of my undergrad degree, and throughout graduate school.

I’ve often said that applying for a job at the Writing Centre was the most impactful personal decision I made while studying at MUN. I got the chance to meet students from all walks of life and all academic backgrounds, and to provide support in a meaningful way. It quickly forced me to become a more empathic and compassionate communicator, and obviously gave me the opportunity to develop my writing skills. But it also introduced me to the people who would go on to be lifelong friends: I still have a core group who all met while working at the Writing Centre. The friends you meet in your twenties see you through some of your most formative life experiences: degrees and the post-graduate job hunt, the transition from renting apartments to owning homes, getting married, having babies. 

We still talk about our time working at the Writing Centre, and as someone who’s since gone on to work in the area of student services, and who now manages my own team of students, I strive to make their on-campus work experience as fulfilling as mine was.