Towards an Integrated Graduate Student (Training Program)

This chapter argues that teaching writing helps graduate students become better writers. Every year, more than 100 graduate students from more than 30 departments participate in one of two required six-week training courses offered through Cornell’s John S. Knight Institute for Writing in the Disciplines. This chapter describes specific features of the training curricula that help graduate students learn to write as academic professionals. Primary source material is drawn from graduate writing produced for course evaluations, assignments, or in response to surveys sent to current and former graduate students. Graduate student observations that figure prominently in this article include a focus on writing process, the connection between teaching writing and learning writing, the value of reflection, and the efficacy of building communities where writers read each other’s work.