Undergraduate Writing Fellows Can Support You to Teach Writing

The Writing Fellows are a group of carefully selected and extensively trained undergraduates who serve as peer writing tutors in courses with writing across the College of L&S.  The Fellows make thoughtful and thorough comments on drafts of assigned papers (usually on two of the assigned papers in a course) and hold conferences with students, in an effort to help students make smart, significant revisions to their papers before the papers are turned in for a grade. Building on the special trust that peers can share, Fellows help students not only to write better papers but also to take themselves more seriously as writers and thinkers.

Selected through a competitive application process, Writing Fellows are chosen for their proven performance as writers and for their strong interest in helping others improve their writing. UW—Madison’s Writing Fellows represent a wide range of majors, including sociology, political science, English, philosophy, molecular biology, physics, and history.

Here’s a faculty comment about the benefits of working with Writing Fellows:

“[The Writing Fellows] were outstanding in their ability to motivate students to adhere to the assignment. In particular, they made sure the students stated and developed arguments in their papers and pushed them to address the readings and important themes from the course.”
-Professor Katherine Cramer Walsh, Political Science

Here’s a comment from a student who received help from a Fellow:

“I found that talking to someone about my paper helped me figure out exactly what I wanted to say and how I could do that…. This was the first experience I’ve had with a Writing Fellow and I thought it was extremely beneficial in improving my writing skills.”
-Junior, sociology major

The Fellows are equipped to tutor writing across the L&S curriculum. In the past, they have worked with students in astronomy, Afro- American studies, history, philosophy, political science chemistry, classics, English, women’s studies, sociology, zoology, mathematics, psychology, geography, and more.

You are eligible to apply to work with a Writing Fellow if you:

• will have between 12 and 40 students enrolled in the course
• are willing to adjust your syllabus to allow time for revision and to require that all enrolled students work with the assigned Fellow(s)
• are willing to meet regularly with the assigned Fellow(s) to discuss assignments

If you would like to learn more about the program or apply to work with a Fellow in a Comm-B course you are teaching, please contact Emily Hall, Director of the Writing Fellows Program (ebhall@wisc.edu,