Writing Assessment and Intervention Program in Criminal Justice 402

February 6, 2017 / Linda Townsend / Uncategorized

Presented by Dr. Virginia Beard

The purpose of this project and corresponding research was to institute a writing improvement program in the course:   Criminal Justice 402:  Criminological Theory.  This program was developed during the winter-intersession of 2015-16 and piloted during the spring semester of 2016. The goal of this project  was to have students not only be forced to work on their papers for a longer period of time (eliminating procrastination) but also to have them receive feedback and advice from the writing center on campus to assist them with the mechanics of writing (flow of ideas, clarity of ideas, tone, grammar, sentence structure and APA format), thus freeing me as the professor to respond to and provide feedback on the quality of their argument, sources, depth and structure of their academic arguments. Further, this project is also aimed at students who are the most in need of writing assistance but are also some of the least likely of our student population to take the advice of instructors and seek said help.  This population includes not only students who have been at Longwood since their freshman year but also new students who have transferred from community colleges.

Presenter bio:

Virginia Beard is a Longwood University Associate Professor of Criminal Justice.  She has a PhD in Sociology from Virginia Tech.

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