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College of Arts and Sciences

FACULTY WRITING GROUP

faculty writing group "Patricia Highsmith said: ‘I cannot think of anything worse or more dangerous than to discuss my work with another writer.’ Patricia Highsmith is wrong." -- Faculty Writing Group Participant

Writing regularly to get scholarship published is an important goal for faculty. But the variety of our commitments often makes it hard to turn the important into urgent. How do we overcome distractions, lack of time, disrupted momentum, competing priorities, isolation, stress, perfectionism, and a whole host of such challenges? 

The Faculty Writing Group program could be your tool for prioritizing writing. We use a simple 3-step model -- report, review, resolve -- to help participants meet their own weekly writing milestones. All you need to do is to get some writing done between one Friday and another and come exchange draft and feedback with another writer.  

BENEFITS

Here are some benefits of working with a Faculty Writing Group: 

  • meeting weekly writing milestones
  • sharing feedback on drafts with another writer
  • practicing/sharing productivity strategies as a writer
  • learning from each other’s experiences, successes/failures, perspectives
  • finding support, motivation, accountability, commiseration, confidence, fun
  • getting to know colleagues beyond one’s department/discipline and their work

HOW IT WORKS 

  1. Participants meet once a week (time and Zoom link provided to those who sign up).
  2. During the meeting, writers 
          • start by reporting to a partner their weekly writing achievements (2 minutes). 
    • 40 min: writers exchange brief portions of their drafts (article draft, book chapter, grant proposal, conference paper, etc) and review each other’s writing, with the writer giving the reader a task/question (e.g., read for organization, clarity, focus, flow, source engagement, editing/style, proofreading, etc) -- they save some time to discuss the feedback 
    • save a few minutes at the end to tell their partners what writing they resolve to do by the next meeting.
  3. Pairs use a “Writing Group Kit” to share some resources/effective practices and to hold each other accountable to their writing goals. 
  4. A facilitator keeps time, notes presence, and writes heads-up emails. 

To sign up for the upcoming session, fill out a one-minute survey below.

Sign up