Writing center

A Writing Center is a counseling center at a university or college, students, graduate students and faculty support. Support writing centers and advise on the writing itself, in monitoring and supervision of students who write theses, and in the development of concepts, writing in teaching in a way that students can be doing in the broadest sense to develop professionally. The foundation of writing centers in German-speaking took place after the example of the Writing Center in the Anglo-Saxon, especially in the U.S. context, which have a much longer tradition.

The institutional positioning of the writing centers at universities is very different. Can writing centers of Germanic or philosophical faculty, an academic teaching facility, the Student Counselling Centre, a department or a psychological counseling institution associated with it. Some universities do not have a means for scientific writing, but offer events for writing, often referred to as a writing workshop. The first device in academic writing at a German university is founded at the University of Bielefeld in 1993 Bielefeld writing lab.

The writing centers at German universities are becoming more numerous. In 1997, the Writing Center at the Ruhr University Bochum and the writing workshop at the University of Duisburg -Essen were founded. In 2001 at the Freiburg University of the establishment of the first write Centre for the teacher / training inside. 2003 saw the founding of the writing center at the University of Cologne. In the years 2006, 2007 and 2008, the International Writing Center at the University of Gottingen, the Writing Centre at the European University Viadrina and the " competence center letter " of the University of Paderborn were founded. Other writing centers are located at the University of Hildesheim and the TU Darmstadt. As part of since 2011 increased financial promotion of quality of teaching and learning by federal and state governments ( " Teaching Quality Pact " ) invest more universities in the creation of writing centers.

At European level, the European Writing Centers Association ( EWCA ) represents the interests of writing centers. The EWCA is a regional organization of the International Writing Centers Association ( IWCA ) and conferences held every two years in different European countries.