Improving the Writing Skills of Bachelor’s and Master’s Students in Education

• In Event: Roundtable Session 129
  In Roundtable Session: Writing

Abstract

Complaints of poor writing permeate secondary education, higher education, and the workplace. This paper describes the efforts of the authors' education school to improve students' literacy skills by identifying those who needed assistance, providing small group instruction and remedial tutoring, and preparing them for the state's mandated literacy examination for licensure for prospective teachers. The greatest area of need was writing. The school's faculty voted to require a literacy exam. From 1998 to 2008, 4,540 took the exam, 1,786 undergraduates and 2,754 graduate students. From anonymous registrar's records we obtained matches to final grades in writing courses, GPA, SAT, GRE, HS GPA and U.S. citizenship status. Multiple regression analyses revealed the high contribution literacy test scores made to GPA.

Authors

• Mary H. Shann, Boston University

• Michael Harten, Boston University