Walk-in Services

At the Writing Center we will help you on any number of writing projects:

• A paper for one of your classes
• An essay for a medical school, law school, or graduate school application
• A resume or job application letter
• A poem, short story, or novel

Because we understand that your interest in improving your writing skills goes beyond the time you spend in writing classes here at Pitzer, we have set up the Writing Center. This is a service.

In the Writing Center, we'll work with you on an individual basis. What happens in your Writing Center conference depends on your needs. If you want help on organizing your paper or developing your ideas, we'll read what you have written and give you feedback. If you want help on grammar and mechanics, we'll help you to learn to correct your errors. Even if you haven't written anything, if you're having trouble getting started, we'll give you strategies and exercises for generating ideas. If you'd simply like someone to listen to something you've written, we'll supply a willing ear. In other words, you set the agenda, and we'll do our best to follow it.

The one thing we will not do in the Writing Center is copy-edit or proofread your work. We'll help you to copy-edit or proofread, but we won't do it for you. It's important to us that the paper improve, but it's more important to us that you improve. We can't make you a better writer--we can only help you to make yourself a better writer. And that won't happen if we do it for you.

The Writing Center works best if you make several appointments for the same paper, and if you make them well ahead of when the paper is due. In one conference we can work with you on the content and organization, and then when you know what you want to say, we can work with you on the style and grammar.

Please don't wait until the last minute before your paper is due!