Welcome fellow GC-ers to issue No. 3 of Revise and Resubmit, the Writing Center’s newsletter! This September, we’ve got a welcome message from Director David Hershinow, some tips and tricks for setting goals for the semester, and details on how you can take a writing break with 2-for-1 tickets to a Broadway show.
Welcome Back!
For those of you who are joining the GC for the first time, welcome! Revise and Resubmit is The Writing Center’s monthly newsletter. Each issue offers timely advice, motivation, and resources. Succeeding in academia is challenging on many different fronts, and chief among these is the hard work of writing. Even the most brilliant scholarship can shine only if it is communicated effectively, and often it’s only through the writing process that we can develop our best ideas in the first place. It takes a lot of writing and revising to sharpen our loose thinking into a rigorous analysis. And yet, the best results can be achieved only when we know how to use the writing process effectively. The Writing Center is here to help you understand the relationship between writing, knowledge creation, and academic excellence. It focuses on practical how-to strategies for doing the hard work of writing to think, revising to rethink, and editing to meet the needs of your reader. Each issue of Revise and Resubmit will offer you some useful practical advice, point you to helpful resources on our website, inform you of upcoming events, and suggest a positive writing break. But more than that, it will remind you that you are not alone in your struggles. Writing is hard; being an academic is humbling. But working your way through to brilliance is worth it!
Featured Resource: Goal Setting for Writers
The start of the semester can be exciting, but also overwhelming. You might be taking classes that require you to research new topics or write in new genres, or suddenly have hours of unstructured writing time as you begin dissertating. Setting habitual goals is a great way to establish practices that will help you complete whatever projects you’re working on. A habitual goal is one that supports the creation of a sustainable habit like writing for a certain amount of time or reaching a certain word count every day. This kind of goal is versatile because you can work on whatever writing is most pressing or even make progress on multiple projects. Your goal should be specific, measurable, and achievable. For example, you could set a daily goal to write for 30 minutes. Setting unrealistic goals—like writing for multiple hours— can actually make you less productive because they aren’t easily achievable. When we don’t meet our goals, we often engage in negative self-talk that diminishes our self-esteem and motivation. Instead, set a habitual goal that is super achievable; once you feel the accomplishment of reaching your goal, you can always keep going! Building a habit around a specific, measurable, and achievable goal is a great way to kick off the semester. If you want to learn more about goal setting, take a look at “Goal Setting for Your Writing” or join us this month for our “Goal Setting and Time Management” Workshop!
Upcoming Events
- Goal Setting and Time Management Workshop — Tuesday, September 10 @ 2:00 PM; register here
- The Academic Job Cover Letter Workshop — Thursday, September 12 @ 4:00 PM; register here
- Writing a Book Review Workshop — Tuesday, September 17 @ 2:00 PM; register here
- Applying for a PhD: The Statement of Purpose — Thursday, September 26 @ 4:00 PM; register here
And Now, Your Writing Break
Form a team with some friends and sign up for The Amazing Race-Style DIY Scavenger Hunt in Central Park. Have an adventure and enjoy the beautiful weather! Learn more here.
