- Entering Freshmen
- Interschool Transfer Students
- Students Transferring from Another College or University
- Portfolio Preparation
- Writing Resources
Being able to express ideas well in writing is an essential quality of an educated person and an important asset in many careers and community activities. All students in Weinberg College are required to demonstrate writing proficiency before graduation.
The WCAS writing proficiency requirement is designed to help ensure that you are prepared to write effectively in your upper level classes. To demonstrate your proficiency, you must write satisfactorily in two courses at Northwestern, typically in freshman seminars during the freshman year.
Entering Freshmen
Most freshmen complete the writing proficiency requirement through their freshman seminars. (HPME and MMSS students are required to take only one freshman seminar, and they have only a one-course writing requirement.) Students who do not complete both required seminars in the freshman year should discuss the situation with a Freshman Adviser or College Adviser.
As part of their teaching responsibilities, freshman seminar instructors evaluate the writing of their students. These evaluations reflect the instructors' assessments of students' writing skills only and do not necessarily correspond to the grades students earn in the seminar courses. Evaluations are forwarded to the Writing Program. If you receive unsatisfactory evaluations in one or both courses, you will be contacted by the Writing Program, and you will meet with a Writing Program adviser to map out a plan for achieving and demonstrating writing proficiency. This plan may include taking an expository writing course (English 105 or English 205) or preparing a portfolio of writing produced in courses beyond the freshman seminars (see the section below on portfolios).
At the beginning of your sophomore year, if you are unsure about whether you have completed the writing requirement you can check your electronic degree audit information on the Registrar's Office website. If you have any questions about the writing requirement you can contact the Writing Program, Crowe Hall 2-184, phone 847-491-7414 or check with a WCAS College Adviser.
Interschool Transfer Students
If you transfer into Weinberg College as a freshman, you are expected to take one or two freshman seminars, depending on your date of transfer, and should plan to meet the writing proficiency requirement as specified above.
If you transfer into the College after freshman year, you are not expected to take freshman seminars, and so may fulfill the writing requirement in one of the following ways:
- completing an equivalent writing proficiency requirement in another division of Northwestern (or in unusual cases at another college or university). Students transferring from MEAS who have completed two quarters of English 106-1,2 - Writing in Special Contexts have automatically fulfilled the requirement; all other students will be referred to the director of the Writing Program.
- successfully completing English 205-0, Intermediate Composition
- demonstrating an ability to write satisfactorily in courses taken at Northwestern by submitting a portfolio of written work for review
All transfer students should plan to meet with their WCAS College Adviser in their first quarter in WCAS to develop a plan for meeting the requirement. Depending on the extent of your writing experience, and your own sense of the strengths and weaknesses in your writing, one or another of these options may be more suitable. In some cases it may be appropriate for you to delay making a decision on the best plan for fulfilling the requirement if you expect to have writing opportunities in your first quarter in WCAS.
Students transferring from another college or university
If you have transferred into Northwestern from another college or university, you have fulfilled the WCAS writing proficiency requirement. If you have questions about how to improve your writing, you can contact an adviser in the Writing Program to talk about writing courses and writing resources available to you.
Portfolio Preparation and Submission
Students who do not complete the writing proficiency requirement through freshman seminars sometimes choose to submit a writing portfolio instead. The portfolio should include three writing samples. At least two should be from courses taken at Northwestern, and at least two should be analytic writing. You should bring print copies of your samples, along with a brief cover letter describing your writing background in college, to your WCAS College Adviser. These will be forwarded to a committee in the Writing Program, and you will be contacted after your writing portfolio has been reviewed. The committee meets several times each quarter.
Resources for students to improve their writing
Completing the writing proficiency requirement represents a minimum level of proficiency. The Writing Program offers many resources to help you not only complete the writing requirement but also continue to improve as a writer throughout your undergraduate career:
- Writing courses: All students are welcome to enroll in an expository writing course at any time if they wish to increase their skill and confidence in writing, and prepare themselves better for more challenging writing projects in their majors. The Writing Program offers three levels of expository writing: English 105, 205, and 305. The Writing Program also offers a number of special-focus courses, such as Writing Women's Lives, which is cross listed with Gender Studies, and Practical Rhetoric (English 304), which is designed to prepare students to tutor in the Writing Place. All courses are described on the Writing Program's web site.
- Peer tutoring: The Writing Place is a peer tutoring center, located in the Core Library area of the Main University Library, that specializes in helping Northwestern students work on their writing. Writing Place consultants are talented undergraduates who are very good writers and who have been specially trained to help their peers at all stages of the writing process without writing the papers for them.
You are welcome to come to The Writing Place as often as you like, to work on specific papers or to address broader writing issues. Many students visit The Writing Place two or three times in the process of writing a paper to get help at various stages. Even very proficient writers benefit from talking through their ideas with a helpful listener or having a careful reader go over a draft.
Writing tip sheets and information are available on The Writing Place web site.
