CSULB's Composition Program: Guest Lecture and Workshop– Nancy Sommers

The Composition Program at CSULB invites attendance at a talk and workshop led by renowned scholar, teacher, and writing program administrator, Nancy Sommers, of Harvard. Her presentation and workshop will focus on the important topic of responding to student writing to inspire revision.

Nancy Sommers has taught writing and mentored new writing teachers for thirty years. For the past twenty years, she led Harvard’s Expository Writing Program, both directing the first-year writing program and establishing Harvard’s Writing Across the Curriculum program. Sommers now teaches at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, where she leads a “Teachers as Writers” initiative. Prior to teaching at Harvard, she directed the University of Oklahoma Writing Program and taught in the Rutgers University, Monmouth College, and Boston University writing programs. Sommers has also helped establish writing programs in Asia and Europe and has been a consultant to over 100 writing programs throughout the United States.

A two-time Braddock Award winner, Sommers is well known for her research and publications on student writing. Her articles “Revision Strategies of Student and Experienced Writers” and “Responding to Student Writing” are two of the most widely read and anthologized articles in the field of Rhetoric and Composition. Sommers’s “Between the Drafts” and “The Novice as Expert: Writing the Freshman Year” are popular readings in first-year studies programs. She has also created three films—Shaped by Writing, Across the Drafts, and Beyond the Red Ink—to bring the voices of student writers into a larger discussion about writing instruction.

Click here for more information about these films.

Nancy Sommers’s recent work involves a longitudinal study that followed 400 Harvard undergraduates through their college careers to understand the role writing plays in undergraduate education. Her current research focuses on the transition from urban high schools to community colleges.

If you are a member of the Composition at the Beach site, you can RSVP directly on the site. Otherwise, please send Sarah Roussin an email at sarah.roussin@student.csulb.edu.

A breakfast reception will be held in The Pyramid Annex at 8:30 AM.