Academic
Exchange Quarterly
Spring 2012 ISSN 1096-1453 Volume 16, Issue 1
To cite, use print source rather than
this on-line version which may not reflect print copy
format requirements or text lay-out and
pagination.
This
article should not be reprinted for inclusion in any publication for sale without
author's explicit permission. Anyone may view, reproduce or store copy of
this article for personal, non-commercial use as allowed by the "Fair
Use" limitations (sections 107 and 108) of the U.S. Copyright law. For
any other use and for reprints, contact article's author(s) who may impose
usage fee.. See also electronic version copyright clearance CURRENT
VERSION COPYRIGHT © MMXII AUTHOR & ACADEMIC EXCHANGE QUARTERLY |
Development of a Collaborative Writing Group
Rachel Noll, Northern Kentucky
University
Helene Arbouet Harte, Northern
Kentucky University
Suzanne Wegener Soled, Northern
Kentucky University
Noll, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Teacher Education; Harte,
Ed.D., is an assistant professor of Early Childhood Education, and Soled,
Ph.D., is a professor and Associate Dean. All authors are members of the
College of Education and Human Services.
Abstract
This paper describes the development of
a writing circle over the course of a semester. These experiences underscore
the benefits of community as emphasized in the research literature. The writing
group created a source of accountability for productivity as well as a safe
space for participants. The authors address strengths, challenges and
suggestions for prospective writing groups.
Introduction
For many faculty, increased pressure and
expectations for scholarship result in worry and apprehension. Writing circles
provide not only opportunities for peer review, but also community, collegiality
and support (Lee & Boud, 2003; Maher, Seaton, McMullen, Fitzgerald,, Otsuji & Lee, 2008;
O’Malley & Lucey, 2008). Participants in writing
groups develop a routine of writing, fostering the process, as well as
facilitating the development of products (Friend & Gonzalez, 2009; Gillespie,
Dolsak, Kochis, Krabill, Lerum, Peterson &
Thomas, 2005; Maher et al., 2008; O’Malley & Lucey,
2008). Feedback from writing groups may help junior faculty to perceive
themselves as scholars and enhance enjoyment of the process (Friend &
Gonzalez, 2009). The support that writing groups provide can lead to increased
job satisfaction and retention of high quality faculty. As McNamara (1999)
points out, job satisfaction encompasses “. . . one’s feelings or state of mind
regarding the nature of their work. Job satisfaction can be influenced by a
variety of factors, e.g. the quality of one’s relationship with their
supervisor, the quality of the physical environment in which
they work, degree of the fulfillment of their work, etc.” (par. 1).
The process of research and writing
should not be isolated from daily practice. Faculty submit writing to peers for
conferences and journals, so peer critique is a familiar part of the process;
research writing groups allow for peer review early on and facilitate academic
development. Providing an accommodating space for dialogue, collaboration and
peer review, writing groups take writing out of isolation and into a shared
experience setting (Lee & Boud, 2003; Maher et
al., 2008).
One
literal way of taking writing out of isolation is to provide a physical space
for writing groups. Elbow and Sorcinelli (2006) describe “Professors as
Writers” as a group that provides a quiet, comfortable working space. The group
evolved from providing seminars to providing a room and time to write.
Participants avoid the distractions that can happen when writing in the office
or at home, and benefit from the motivation of working in a common space as
well as moving out of isolation (Elbow & Sorcinelli, 2006).
Writing
circle participation can promote productivity in scholarship as well as enhance
teaching. For Fassinger, Gilliland and Johnson (1992), participation in a
writing group inspired faculty members to implement student peer review of
papers as part of class. Review of peer writing helped students to see that
others have similar struggles, increasing both confidence and competence. For
the faculty members, participation in a writing group enhanced the ability to
consider challenges with completion of work, the importance of strength-based
constructive feedback and awareness of discipline-specific expectations. These
considerations resulted in professors incorporating the students’ perspectives
in course planning and evaluations of assignments. Approaches towards student
learning evolved as the faculty members were better able to reach students at
various levels.
As
faculty grow and change, so may a writing group. As individuals develop skills,
their confidence increases (Maher et al., 2008; O’Malley & Lucey, 2008), which may influence the dynamics of the
group. Writing groups can transition over time and must balance individual
interests with those of the whole (O’Malley & Lucey,
2008). The identity of individuals, as well as the identity of the group,
changes over the course of participation in a writing group.
In
this paper, we will discuss the development of a collaborative faculty writing
group over the course of two years. We document the evolution of the group
through the selection process based on the criteria of interests and needs of
each faculty member. In the process of working together, a “safe space” for
inquiry and critique was created that allowed members to receive critical
feedback and support necessary to advance their scholarly agendas and tackle
other professional and personal issues that faculty members face. Over the two
year process, members of the group fashioned a sense of caring and community,
what Nel Noddings refers to as an “ethics of care,” which extended outside of
the group’s original intent and promoted collegiality as well as job
satisfaction.
Supporting Faculty
Our institution has already established
ways to support faculty. At the
institutional level, for example, there is a day-long orientation for new
faculty and ongoing professional development for all faculty in areas such as
technology and pedagogy. In our college,
each untenured faculty member is provided with a tenured faculty mentor to help
successfully integrate into the culture.
Through guidance and support from their mentor, untenured faculty
receive the help they need to establish their career priorities and succeed in
attained promotion and tenure. At the
department level, the New Faculty Collaborative (NFC) provides a more
structured supportive environment for helping new faculty become acculturated
to institution particulars with regard to teaching and scholarship (Soled, Jones, Doerger, Gilbert, &
Eisenhardt, 2009). Out of discussions and collaborations through the New
Faculty Collaborative which evolved over four years, faculty who were untenured
and beyond their first year, as well as tenured faculty, looked for a community
that would provide a supportive environment to help them accomplish their
writing agendas. Thus, the idea for writing circles became an extension of the
New Faculty Collaborative. The New Faculty Collaborative began in the
2007-2008 academic year. Writing Circles developed in the Fall of the 2009-2010
academic year.
How Writing Circles Developed
Several faculty members, both tenured
and untenured, believed that writing circles could be a way of enhancing
faculty collegiality and research. We set out to bring together small groups
of faculty, composed of three to four individuals, who would meet on a regular
basis to support each other in their scholarship—providing feedback on ideas,
or writing, or however this group would choose to interact. These circles
would facilitate faculty writing and foster the development of an
interdisciplinary community, nurturing creativity and risk taking in writing
(Gillespie, et. al. 2005).
An
email invitation to the faculty of the entire college was sent by one of the
three department chairs gauging interest in participating in such a group,
which was viewed as a type of professional support and was totally voluntary. A
dozen faculty members who expressed interest in attending an initial meeting
came together to decide whether or not to participate in a group and how they
would like the group to function. The participants included faculty who
were from the ranks of lecturer, assistant professor, associate professor and
professor; some untenured, some tenured; with higher education experience
ranging from one to twenty-five years.
Each
person expressed expectations for what he/she hoped to gain from participating
in a writing circle. Faculty
self-selected into groups based on interests and needs. Our group developed
from a shared need for accountability and motivation to write. We began by
exchanging writing and offering constructive critique. After the fall semester
of 2009, we realized a need to set aside time to write and moved from bi-weekly
feedback sessions to weekly sessions where we set aside time to write in two
hour blocks.
Creation of a Safe Space
Participation in the writing group
allowed for a safe space for inquiry and critique. As the group developed, we
had created quite literally a safe space, a physical space where we could
escape from the rest of our professional life to write. Meeting in a conference
room at a designated time and place afforded limited distractions, colleagues
to provide feedback while writing and permission to focus on writing. In the
efforts to meet expectations for reappointment, promotion and tenure, we faced
a challenge in our work/life balance. Successfully setting aside time for writing
facilitated time management overall in our lives. The realization of success in
one area led to small strides in other areas. During the second semester, we
began to block off time for other pursuits as well, such as exercise and
relationships with friends and family.
Our writing circle, like the NFC, was a
safe place to take risks; we tried out ideas, brainstormed, tested various word
choices and read and critiqued each others’ manuscripts. Each member provided support to the others in
our group, reducing isolation around our writing agendas and generating
camaraderie among the writing circle members.
For some of us, it was accountability—simply knowing that we would be
sharing with our other writing circle members on a designated day spurred us on
to write. For others it was knowledge—thinking where we might publish or
present our work or advising on some aspect of mechanism, usage or
grammar. For all of us it was
support—giving encouragement, playfully nudging or challenging our thinking
critically and invaluably. Our group
talked together and it resulted in clarifying our own writing agendas, helped
us to think of new outlets for publishing our writing, provided feedback on our
writing and inspired new ways of thinking about our work. The dialogue was
inclusive; all members were contributors and it continued the new collaborative
college culture whose beginnings were in the NFC but now extending the culture
in new ways.
Conclusion
The pressures and expectations of
scholarship can be both daunting and isolating, not only for junior faculty but
experienced faculty as well. One practice that can help minimize worry and
apprehension surrounding scholarship is the creation of writing circles. Not
every writing group functions in the same manner and for the same purpose; nor
should it. Members’ needs vary and should be taken into consideration when
creating each writing group.
Writing groups form their own sense of
identity and purpose, creating their own rules and guidelines for members to
follow. Our original focus centered on accountability and motivation to write
but, as time went on, we found other issues such as time management, work/life
balance, and physical space affecting our writing. We modified the informal rules
and guidelines of the group midstream to accommodate our needs and create a
space where members felt they could ask questions, accept criticism and take
risks in developing and pursuing a research agenda. This response to needed
change of our purpose created a feeling of community and caring that went
further than the original intention of the group.
This sense of caring and community
fostered what Nel Noddings (1992) referred to as “ethics of care,” a caring
relation as a connection or encounter between two human beings, a carer (care giver) and a cared-for, in which both parties
contribute to the relationship in characteristic ways (p. 15). The
relationships created in the circle allowed two junior faculty members to see
themselves as emerging scholars and trusted colleagues, while allowing an
experienced faculty member to serve as a mentor, as well as rejuvenate her own
scholarly agenda. The shared experience of struggles balancing personal and
professional obligations led us to engage in an ethics of care that extended
outside of the time set aside for the writing group.
The “ethics of care” concept produced an
unintended, but very beneficial, aspect of the writing circle-an increased sense
of job satisfaction, which we identified through our group discussions. Weiss
and Cropanzano (1996, as cited in Thoms, Dose, and Scott, 2002), contend that
“job satisfaction represents a person’s evaluation of his or her job and work
context.” The accountability, knowledge, and support shared within the group
can be seen as implicit acknowledgement of each individual’s satisfaction with his
or her job and the work that faculty member was accomplishing. The impact of
the writing group had come full circle.
References
Elbow, P. &
Sorcinelli, M.D. (2006, November/December). The faculty writing place: A room
of our own. Change.
17-22.
Fassinger, P.A., Gilliland, N., & Johnson, L.L.
(1992). Benefits of a faculty writing circle: Better teaching. College
Teaching, 40(2), 53-56.
Friend, J.I. & González, J.C. (2009,
January-February). Get together to write. Retrieved from AAUPAcademeOnline:
http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/pubsres/academe/2009/JF/Feat/frie.htm
Gillespie, D., Dolsak, N., Kochis, B., Krabill, R., Lerum, K., Peterson,
A., & Thomas, E. (2005). Research circles: Supporting the scholarship of
junior faculty. Innovative Higher Education,
30(3), 149-162. doi:
10.1007/s10755-05506300-9
Lee, A., & Boud, D. (2003). Writing groups, change and academic
identity: Research development as local practice. Studies in Higher Education, 28(2), 187-200.
doi:10.1080/0307507032000058109
Maher, D., Seaton, L.,
McMullen, C., Fitzgerald, T., Otsuji, E., & Lee,
A. (2008). Becoming and being writers: The experiences of doctoral students in
writing groups. Studies in Continuing Education, 30(3),
263-275. doi: 10.1080/01580370802439870
McNamara (1999). Job satisfaction. Retrieved from Free Management Library at
http:// managementhelp.org/prsn_wll/job_stfy.htm
O’Malley, G.S. & Lucey, T.A. (2008). Promise and
possibility: Building collegial opportunities for scholarship. Academic Leadership, 6(3): Retrieved from
Noddings, N. (1992). The challenge to care in schools: An alternative approach to education.
New York: Teachers College Press.
Soled, S. W., Jones, M. M., Doerger, D. W., Gilbert, J. L., & Eisenhardt, S. K. (2009). A collaborative for mentoring new faculty. The Department Chair, 19(3), 22-23.
Thoms, P., Dose, J., & Scott, K. (2002). Relationships between accountability, job satisfaction, and trust. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 13(3), 307-323.