Writing Center Story

“Our job is to work with the students,” said tutor Angelica Blazina, “not to do the work for them.”

The room is off-white; every nook and cranny of the space available is used for desks, chairs, or computers. At the front of the room, just a few feet ahead of the entrance, is the desk where I was promptly greeted. Even late at night the the room is buzzing with activity. This is the Writing Center in the North Hall building, directed by Professor Livia Katz, where students don’t come to have their papers simply edited or graded: they come to improve their writing style and thinking process.

“I’m taking it for English,” said Tracy Raysor, a sophomore who has been coming to the Writing Center since the beginning of the semester. “My trouble area is organizing my thoughts in my writing and grammar and mechanics,” said Tracy, who had been recommended by her professor, Professor Goldstein, for help in essays, research papers, and learning the APA format. “I have a great tutor, Angelica. She’s very good. She understands my writing.”

The Writing Center isn’t only for English though, as some commonly believe. “We offer a variety of workshops,” said Zully, a tutor handling the front desk shared, “we offer grammar workshops, we offer how to write for biochemistry workshops, writing for history workshops…pretty much any subject we offer workshops on how to write for them. Students can come, and work on those particular disciplines, or students can come work with us one on one for turtoring.”

“We’ve had papers from science, literature, math,” said long-time tutor and supervisor Kennesha Barnwell, surrounded by other long time tutors Angelica and Roxanne Sejarto, who’ve worked there for about seven years, among others. “Yes, we’ve had math papers. I don’t know why we’ve had math papers, it was rare, but we get papers from math.”

Day to day students generally walk in, either taking any tutor available.

Over time some begin to schedule appointments with those favored tutors. But during certain academic “seasons” of the year, walk-ins find there are less tutors available, and competitive reservations may begin.

During the times of the Cuny Proficiency Exam, mid-terms, and finals, the tutors find themselves with more students and appointments than they can handle. “We’ve had over a thousand students come in for individual appointments. And for the workshops we have seven workshops a day, full with 30 people, 40 people…” said Kennesha, shaking her head as she leaned back in her seat. “It’s absolutely impossible because the CPE, the exam, is happening now, but during testing time, mid-terms, and finals we’re always swamped…and we have less funding and less staff [than before]…”

“Most people walk in, but some are powerhouse workshops, like the CPE, so people want to register to reserve a seat,” added Zully.

But still the tutors work with great proficiency, a literary version of Spartans tackling an overwhelming workload and still making it through stronger than ever. Tutors themselves are hand-picked by and go through a long path to becoming a full tutor. “It’s based on recommendation,” Zully comments as she assists an outgoing student setting up her next appointment, “[then] you have to take a year course before you’re allowed to teach and tutor.” Finishing with her student, she turns and folds her legs in her chair. “There’re two courses; varying types of grammar, varying types of teaching skills, and public speech. It’s pretty, pretty intense.” These courses are not open to any student either, but reserved for the tutors through ‘independent study’, which earns credit and can work towards an English Honors.

Later, tutors receive addition training. “Everyone is training to work in every discipline; tutors in training are not allowed to teach the CPEs; very rarely will anyone see a tutor in training teaching; since they’re in training they’ll really be observing.”

But tutors aren’t just glorified students with a knack for writing and simple patience. Many are graduates, and, according to Kennesha, “more than half of the permanent staff have a Masters Degree, or is working towards one.” Some have even gone into teaching, like Angelica, who began teaching at John Jay this semester as a Professor. The transition from student to tutor is smooth, according to the tutors, and Roxanne adds “you feel good, coming full circle.”

But it also doesn’t make it any easier when dealing with troublesome students. “When I first became a tutor, I guess I was a little naïve,” said Angelica, wearing an embarrassed blush while in thought of a past student. “I was a little too nice and she started coming with big piles of research, to leave them for me to read, so I could tell her what I read and tell her what she should read.”

“Students need to know we’re not doing their work,” added Kennesha firmly. “: “Students come in here and they think we’re being mean and assume we’re being lazy and we don’t want to do our work and why we’re repelling them, it’s because we’re not in charge of interpretation, the process you bring to us is the final product. We can help you enhance it and make it better but it’s still up to you to interpret your assignment. It’s your work. We can’t write it for you.”

It doesn’t end there either: often, like police officers, the tutors find that they’re never off duty. “Someone hands you a paper at the store and asks you to read it,” Kennesha said with a smile. “Or you’re walking home to the subway and someone hands you a paper because they recognize you.”

“It’s New York, you can’t miss that, there’s always something interesting,” Zully said, laughing. “We get the worst, the best, the crazy people, the perfectly sane people. We get the whole line.”

But all of the tutors gathered agree on one thing. “When you get a student in here and they want to improve, they’re the best you can get,” said Kennesha. “When you get students who come in and say ‘I don’t want to be here,’ it’s just horrible. It can make an hour session feel like forever.”

“To have a student come back and say thank you for the help, it always makes you feel good,” added Roxanne.

“I had one at graduation,” relates Kennesha with a smile as her eyes wandered up to the ceiling, “who dragged me to meet her mom and dad and grandmother…and her mom said ‘you’ve helped her so much’, and I was like ‘oh my god, I feel so happy!’”

At the end of the day, through the long workloads and difficult sessions, the group seems to draw it’s energy from each other. As some tutors head home, many hug or kiss cheek to cheek farewells, saying goodbye until the next day.

“I’ve met some of my best friends from this staff,” Roxanne said excitedly, beaming a grin to her friends.

“We’re all enjoying our time together because it’s a great group of people to work with,” said Kennesha. “We’re definitely family.”