Designing this center, I certainly have had a variety of
writing center models to choose from, but I have selected
one that is most advantageous for Baylor students. Namely,
the Baylor Writing Center focus is on the writer, not the
teacher. While many high school writing centers are staffed
by English teachers (who despite kind intentions may intimidate
students because their roles are those of graders), Baylor's
tutors do not teach in the classroom and are devoted to making
students feel comfortable in this space beyond the classroom.
As a result, Baylor School is able to provide its students
with essential support for writing both outside and inside
the classroom.
Another advantage of the Baylor Writing Center is its corps of trained student writing tutors, who receive weekly in-depth training for one year and have the opportunity to read from
college-level texts about tutoring as well as consider recent
articles of writing center scholarship. Theirs is a rare
opportunity at the high school level. Subsequently, they can
apply their tutoring knowledge to both the academy and the
workplace. In fact, writing center tutoring offers leadership
positions in the school community as well as service to that
community; and as the tutors learn to work with their peers,
they gain useful life skills.
In my time here, I have learned to be proud of Baylor's writing
tutors whose insights and commitment allow them to serve others and
their school. When I was working for my composition doctorate, I
did not anticipate that high school students could learn to be capable
tutors like the graduate students I was supervising in one of the
country's best university writing centers. Then, as now, most writing
center practitioners dismissed or disregarded high school writing
centers, but a look at a rigorous program such as Baylor's could
help them understand how fruitful a secondary writing center endeavor
can be because high school students bring a particular energy to
tutoring. Today I know that the enthusiasm of Baylor's writing tutors
is remarkable and that Baylor students supporting other Baylor students
becomes a tangible way of improving the writing abilities of both
tutors and tutees.
Dr. Marsha Penti
Writing Center Director
AB, Beloit College, 1967
AM, Indiana University, 1971
PhD, Indiana University, 1983
MS, Michigan Technological University, 1991
PhD, Michigan Technological University, 1998
Appointed 1995