The Writing-Attentive Curriculum

The Writing-Attentive Curriculum at Bates College

The writing-attentive curriculum at Bates College is designed to provide students with a solid footing in using writing as a means for communication, scholarship, intellectual discovery and civic action. Writing is here construed broadly, to include multiple languages, modalities, and means of communication. While in many cases the criteria defined here may apply to written English academic prose, they apply as well to writing in non-English languages, oral communication, electronically mediated forms of writing, the visual presentation of information, or poetic/artistic means of written expression.

W1, W2, and W3

W1 Courses (First Year Seminars)

Courses at the W1 level are focused on helping students to develop a useful process for writing, to transfer the writing skills with which they enter college to their studies at Bates, and to acquire foundational skills that they can then transfer to writing in subsequent courses.Students in W1 courses begin to explore the idea that criteria for writing vary across disciplines, genres, and communities.

W1 Outcomes*

Outcome 1: Students identify, analyze, and compose in varied genres and across rhetorical contexts.

  • Students identify rhetorical strategies and genre-specific conventions and how they are used to effectively communicate with an intended audience.
  • Students analyze rhetorical contexts (genre, audience, purpose) in texts and in the writing they produce.
  • Students apply rhetorical strategies as they compose in a range of genres.

Outcome 2: Students practice writing and researching as a multi-step and iterative process.

  • Students brainstorm, outline, draft, revise, and edit.
  • Students conceive ideas, refine their focus, organize their ideas, and present their ideas.
  • Students reflect on their own writing and writing process, identifying areas of strength and areas for growth, to inform iterations of their work.
  • Students develop research skills through finding, exploring, critically analyzing, and ethically using information and sources.

Outcome 3: Students recognize and articulate the interplay of language and identity in their own writing and in the works of others.

  • Students consider intersectional identities and social locations in reference to authorship, linguistic power, and privilege.
  • Students articulate their own position(s) relative to those of others.
  • Students begin to identify and develop their own voice and style.

You are also welcome to reach out to the Center for Inclusive Teaching and Learning or the Writing Committee with your questions about creating, proposing, or teaching a W1 course at Bates.

W2 Courses

Courses at the W2 level are focused on helping students to find their voice within their chosen field of study. Students in W2s learn about how knowledge and understanding are communicated in major disciplines or interdisciplinary programs. W2 courses orient students to the unique and often idiosyncratic expectations for communication that exist within every academic discipline, preparing students to produce scholarship within their major.

W2 Outcomes*

Outcome 1: Students analyze and compose texts in the genre(s) and convention(s) of a particular discipline or interdisciplinary field.

  • Students identify and apply discipline- or field-specific rhetorical strategies, forms of evidence, and stylistic norms.
  • Students articulate how genre, purpose, and audience shape writing within the discipline or field.
  • Students demonstrate awareness of the expectations for writing, research, and citation within the discipline of the field.

Outcome 2: Students practice writing and research as a multistep, iterative, and inquiry-driven process that contributes to–or productively questions–disciplinary or interdisciplinary knowledge.

  • Students refine research questions and arguments in dialogue with existing literature and/or scholarship within the discipline or field.
  • Students incorporate and analyze appropriate sources and practice using discipline- or field-specific research strategies.
  • Students revise and edit their work in response to feedback and to deepen their engagement with discipline- or field-specific expectations.

Outcome 3: Students develop a critical awareness of their position as writers within the discourse of a discipline or interdisciplinary field.

  • Students situate their ideas in relation to other voices within the discipline or field.
  • Students reflect on the development of their scholarly voice and growing fluency in disciplinary or field-specific discourse.
W3 Courses

W3 is a thesis or capstone experience, in which Bates students create an original, significant work of scholarship that represents the culmination of their growth as writers, scholars, and researchers during their time at the college. Faculty are encouraged to consider these values in designing courses that satisfy the W3 requirement. Learning outcomes and guidelines for W3 are set by individual departments.

* W1 and W2 outcomes were developed jointly by the Writing Committee and The Center for Teaching and Inclusive Learning in Spring 2025. These outcomes are a living document, and may be modified in response to curriculum and learning assessment efforts.

Your Writing Resources at Bates
Writing Committee
Student Writing and Language Center
Center for Inclusive Teaching and Learning