The Writing Center manages a range of professional development courses designed to help students at the Graduate Center in their careers and professional activities. While topics vary, each class shares the common purpose of providing a low-stakes, low-workload space in which students can gain relevant practical experience alongside knowledgeable faculty and a community of peers.

These courses do not carry credit, are ungraded, and do not appear on the student’s transcript.Students register for these courses as they do their academic classes: log into CUNYFirst; go to Student Center and select “Search,” which takes you to the “Search for Classes” page. Select the institution (Graduate Center), the term, and enter the course number (listed below).

Note: Because these courses are zero-credit, Level 3 students are eligible to enroll.

Public Writing for Academics (PDEV 79406)

More and more, scholars are writing for public audiences. Participating in public writing can be a way for academic writers to contribute to important conversations, to make their work meaningful in new ways, to expand and advance their careers, and to re-engage with their own research on a personal level. Over the course of the semester, we’ll discuss genres including op-eds, reviews, essays, reported journalism, and public-facing books, and we’ll meet several widely published writers who got their start in PhD programs. By the end of the semester, each student will have drafted and workshopped a piece of writing and will be ready to submit it for publication.

Professor: Briallen Hopper
Time: Tuesdays, 6:30-8:30 PM (online)

Writing the Dissertation (PDEV 79407)

Writing the Dissertation is a course that supports you through the writing process as you work toward completing the dissertation. Designed to help you with everything from writing schedules to chapter drafts, the course aims to demystify what makes a great dissertation happen. You will be writing and sharing your work in the form of outlines, chapter abstracts, and of course completed chapter drafts; you will also prepare timetables for a sane schedule of work and write an “elevator speech” summary of your project for interviews and your CV. You will get a chance to critique completed dissertations in your disciplines and will also have time to review the common practices of academic discourse and rhetoric. We will also discuss how all students, especially historically underrepresented graduate students, can use mentoring, writing groups, and other strategies to achieve their academic writing goals.

Section 1

Professor: Dave Hershinow

Time: Mondays, 11:45 AM-1:45 PM (online)

Section 2

Professor: Elizabeth Dill
Time: Wednesdays, 2:00-4:00 PM (in-person)

Writing the Article (PDEV 79409)

This course is designed to help you understand and navigate the process of publishing academic journal articles. Whether you are grappling with how to turn a seminar or conference paper into an article, working through a “revise and resubmit,” or just wanting to get a better sense of how academic journal publishing works, this course will offer practical guidance and support.We will talk about the concrete steps in the article publishing process, from how to find the best journals for your work, to the nuts and bolts of submitting your manuscript, to how to deal with readers’ reports and requests for revisions. We will also discuss how to get from ideas, papers, or drafts to finished, polished journal articles, and you will have the opportunity to workshop writing in progress. The syllabus will be developed in consultation with students, so that it is tailored to the particular questions and projects participants bring to the group.

Professor: Libby Garland
Time: Wednesdays, 11:45 AM-1:45 PM (in-person)

Effective Academic Writing for Native English Speakers (PDEV 79403)

This course grounds students in the fundamental elements that inform all argument-based academic writing in order to help them better understand and navigate the sometimes bewildering array of genres in which they are expected to write, from seminar papers and conference presentations to grant applications and dissertation proposals to theses, dissertations, job letters, abstracts, and journal articles. At once a seminar and a workshop, this course combines opportunities for peer review with instruction in the genres of academic writing, revision techniques, advanced outlining, the art of the paragraph, methods for overcoming writer’s block, and other skills. The syllabus will be developed in coordination with students’ stated interests and needs.

Professor: Alexandra Milsom
Time: Mondays, 11:45 AM-1:45 PM (online)

Effective Academic Writing for Multilingual Students (PDEV 79403)

This course is a workshop that aims to help non-native English-speaking students take control of their writing process as they move forward in their graduate studies. We look at the conventions that shape academic writing, keeping in mind that these conventions vary from discipline to discipline and from genre to genre. We focus on the writing process by looking at various steps we can take in order to create “effective academic writing,” with emphasis on discussing writing in progress. Students work on improving writing projects connected to their coursework. We deal with grammar and other writing convention issues as needed.

Professor: Brooke Schreiber
Time: Tuesdays, 11:45 AM-1:45 PM (online)

Teaching Strategies (PDEV 79401)

This course provides Graduate Center students from all disciplines with community and structure to help them prepare for and reflect upon their development as teachers. Our work will proceed from an understanding of the social contexts of teaching, as well as the positionalities of graduate student instructors and adjuncts. Short theoretical readings will help guide participants’ exploration and development of their teaching philosophies and materials. The course curriculum and structure will be responsive to the group’s needs, and the moments when we teach. In Spring 2024, the course will address the challenges of the ongoing public health and social crises, and of the ongoing transition back to face-to-face or hybrid teaching in the 2023-2024 academic year. Foundational topics explored in the course will include classroom community, student-centered and active learning approaches, accessibility, course design and policies, lesson planning, assignment design, assessment, educational technology, cultivating student writing, affective responses in classroom settings, and culturally responsive pedagogy. For questions about the course, please reach out to Dr. Hurson (lhurson@gc.cuny.edu).

Professor: Laurie Hurson
Time: Fridays, 9:30 AM-11:30 AM (online)