{"id":355,"date":"2023-10-19T09:50:42","date_gmt":"2023-10-19T13:50:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/?p=355"},"modified":"2026-01-12T15:01:38","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T20:01:38","slug":"respect-reciprocity-and-responsibility-in-the-pwsa-fys-instructor-partnership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/2023\/10\/19\/respect-reciprocity-and-responsibility-in-the-pwsa-fys-instructor-partnership\/","title":{"rendered":"Respect, Reciprocity, and Responsibility in the PWSA-FYS Instructor Partnership"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Professors Martin Montgomery, Justine Wiesinger, and William (Bill) Wallace share their experiences and reflect on partnering with their course-attached peer tutors (PWSAs) to teach writing in their First-Year Seminars (FYSs).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the fall semester of 2019 winds down, Writing@Bates is taking a moment to reflect on one of the unique academic support services offered to first-year students and First-Year Seminar (FYS) faculty at Bates: the Peer Writing & Speaking Associate<\/a><\/em>, or PWSA. PWSAs are Bates sophomores, juniors, and seniors who are trained, supported, and mentored by Writing@Bates professional staff<\/a> at the start of\u2014and throughout\u2014the fall semester as they learn about theories of writing and oral communication and best practices in tutoring others; some PWSAs are also Writing Fellows who take our spring short term course EDU s19: Tutoring and Writing Center Theory & Practice<\/em>. Typically PWSAs are hired in the spring and then thoughtfully paired with faculty-partners teaching individual sections of First-Year Seminars (W1) in the fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By scheduling and leading confidential one-on-one and group tutoring sessions, as well as class presentations and workshops, PWSAs provide first-year students with empathetic peer mentorship and collaborative guidance on their FYS partner-professor\u2019s writing and speaking assignments for the course. PWSAs are also encouraged to offer feedback to their partner-professor on those assignments and to inform their partner-professors about students\u2019 common struggles with these assignments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the start of the semester, I offered our FYS faculty some resources on how best to engage with their PWSAs, including this handout<\/a> and some chapters from Engaging Students as Partners in Learning and Teaching<\/a><\/em> (2014), a text recommended by my colleague, Lynn Mandeltort<\/a>, in which authors Alison Cook-Sather, Catherine Bovill, and Peter Felten discuss three key principles in student-faculty partnerships: reciprocity<\/a><\/strong>, <\/a>respect<\/a><\/strong>, and <\/a>responsibility<\/a><\/strong>. This past fall, three PWSA-faculty pairs, including<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Martin Montgomery<\/a><\/strong> (Math) and Amanda Mai Becker<\/strong> (\u201822, Music\/Psychology major & Educational Studies\/Chemistry minor),<\/p>\n<\/div>

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Justine Wiesinger<\/a><\/strong> (Asian Studies\/Japanese) and Hazel Simpson<\/strong> (\u201820, Psychology major & Japanese minor), and<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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William Wallace<\/a><\/strong> (Education and Environmental Studies) and Alex Burbelo<\/strong> (\u201822, Biology major), made their partnerships work in these specific principled ways.<\/p>\n<\/div>

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For one, these faculty attempted to be aware of the demands of the academic workload their PWSA faced outside of the partnership and were respectful of the time the PWSA needed to prepare for supporting the FYS students. As Dr. Wiesinger pointed out, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI try to be clear about what I need and give Hazel plenty of notice when I need to ask for something.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Similarly, Dr. Montogomery stated that he \u201ctreat[ed] the partnership as a professional collaboration [by] . . .  always try[ing] to value Amanda\u2019s time, [and] . . . forecast upcoming assignments.\u201d When PWSAs were given sufficient lead-time on upcoming writing or speaking assignments, they could plan their tutoring sessions appropriately around their academic schedule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When partner-professors were open to feedback and willing to change assignments based on that feedback, both partners and the students seemed to benefit. Alex, for example, was able to offer his partner-professor \u201cthe perspective of a student who has far less knowledge of both the subject matter and the course\u201d and suggested this perspective was valuable because \u201cit is really easy for the instructor to not have as realistic an understanding of the needs of students.\u201d On one particular assignment, Alex pointed out to his partner-professor that students would likely be overwhelmed by the amount of reading and so his partner-professor \u201cchose to shorten the assignment\u201d which, Alex said, helped the FYS students manage it more effectively and confidently and feel a \u201csense of fulfillment and ease,\u201d \u201cconfidence,\u201d and \u201can eagerness to keep improving throughout the rest of their time here at Bates.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Faculty repeatedly pointed to the importance of this reciprocal approach, as well. All three faculty offered their PWSAs early drafts of their writing and speaking assignments and asked their PWSAs for feedback on those assignments from a students\u2019 perspective before they distributed them to their FYS students. Dr. Wiesinger, for example, was appreciative for and open to Hazel\u2019s feedback on a rubric she designed for assessing her students\u2019 writing: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cHazel gave me specific, clear feedback without hesitating. I was able to use that right away.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

As part of this healthy give-and-take, PWSAs in these partnerships felt emboldened to offer their frank opinions and ask specific questions for clarification on the professor\u2019s assignments. Not only did this help the PWSAs, it also equipped them for offering the kind of support the first-year students needed because they felt clear about the professor’s assignment expectations. In this way, they were able to act as knowledgeable liaisons between the professors and students. As Amanda pointed out, for example,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cRather than making an assumption about Martin\u2019s intentions and\/or…jumping to conclusions, I actively attempt to remain open by responding with a question [and he asks] me what I think about his assignments and course content. . . . We are both learning from and teaching each other.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

It turns out, too, that modeling effective partnership and collaboration allowed students in these First-Year Seminars to understand that learning is something for which all parties can take responsibility. Indeed, as Bill Wallace pointed out, \u201cthis [team-approach] is how the most effective learning in college is done.\u201d When PWSAs and their partner-professors present themselves as a pedagogical team, students in the course benefit from watching this collaboration play out. Amanda underscored the importance of this positive dynamic:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cStudents see that being a PWSA is not just being another type of student but also a teacher and collaborator with the professor. When I come to visit the class, Martin always looks to me to provide insight on whatever topic he is discussing. It shows students that they can be and are contributors of knowledge in the classroom.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Further, this approach helps first-year students really get a sense that the professor cares about and is open to students\u2019 thoughts and opinions which breaks down the typical professor-student hierarchy that many students feel intimidated by, particularly in their first year in college. As Dr. Wiesinger reported,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI really care about listening to voices besides my own and seeking input from a student perspective\u201d because, she went on, \u201clearning is something we divide, share, and circulate.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Wiesinger attributed part of the resulting \u201cpositive mood\u201d in her FYS to the fact that her students felt so \u201csupported and listened to,\u201d a way of relating that she and Hazel modeled often. Professors who partner with PWSAs in this reciprocal, respectful manner are engaged in an approachable, open, and caring pedagogy from which all students can benefit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another beneficial aspect of these partnerships was how the PWSAs were allowed to have autonomy and confidentiality with the students they supported and to build rapport in their own way but with clear guidelines and within reasonable parameters set out by the professor. This balance required effective communication and clarity around the PWSAs’ professional responsibilities. As Professor Wallace pointed out, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI let Alex know what needs to be done, and let him develop the strategy to get it done the best way he sees fit for the student and the situation.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

He went on to praise Alex\u2019s keen ability to do this for his initial class presentation about his role as a PWSA: \u201cHe had a short Power Point and a warm discussion that followed.\u201d Likely this had something to do with the many students in the class who sought out and benefitted from Alex\u2019s support over the course of the semester. Bill made clear that his students \u201cassured him that their success had been helped along by having Alex\u201d as their PWSA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of the most wonderful things I heard in interviewing these pedagogical pairs were what the professors learned about writing instruction from their PWSAs. In short, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  • getting a students\u2019 perspective on our writing assignments matters and benefits everyone, <\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • engaging students in effective peer review and writing workshops, and having the PWSAs assist with these reviews and workshops, works well,<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • clarity and simplicity in our writing assignments is helpful for students (and leads to better papers), and<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • teaching writing is a huge job that we can\u2019t do alone, not even in one semester, so why not work on it together?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    Indeed, why not<\/em> approach the teaching of writing in our classrooms with the same respectful, reciprocal, and responsible spirit as did these wonderful partners in pedagogy?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Professors Martin Montgomery, Justine Wiesinger, and William (Bill) Wallace share their experiences…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1102,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","with-sidebar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1102"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1063,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions\/1063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/student-writing-language-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}