Designing Effective Training Programs for Discipline-Specific Peer Writing Tutors

Abstract

This article demonstrates how the training of peer writing tutors in a disciplinary setting can be informed by writing centre scholarship and framed by the “Statement on Writing Centres and Staffing” (Graves, 2016). More particularly, the article offers a set of theory-supported criteria for designing effective training programs for peer tutors working in discipline-specific writing centres. It then describes a writing tutor-training program developed for an Eastern Ontario law school that incorporates many of the training criteria. The criteria are derived from theories about writing centre pedagogy, the writing process, and effective training for peer writing tutors. The criteria are framed by three of the statement’s “Best Instructional Practices for Writing Centres”: (1) peer tutors need to be educated and mentored; (2) writing support is best attended to in disciplinary contexts; and (3) writing professionals use and apply research from writing studies.