Party like it's 1996

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This is not the rant I alluded to a post or few ago, but it is probably going to be a bit of a rant. Over the past couple of days, there have been a number of appeals in various fora for feedback on the "Technology Section" of the WPA Outcomes document. You can follow the link to look at the comments thus far offered, but allow me to reproduce it here:

Computer Literacy

Multiple problems arise from constructing any set of prescribed first-year outcomes relating to technology. Two problems are foremost:

(1) Schools and students who have access to technology are more likely to have the prescribed knowledge or skills than students who have limited access to technology. By imposing a set of outcomes related to technology, we are making school harder for those who are lower in the socioeconomic spectrum of society and consequently have less access to technology.

(2) Teachers may be encouraging a non-critical approach to incorporating technology into writing classes.

Teachers need to avoid using technology for its own sake (and for the sake of those who sell it); on the other hand, students who have a critical awareness of technology and how to use it when writing are more employable than students who do not. Within those parameters, we propose the following set of outcomes:

By the end of first-year composition, students should have a critical understanding of digital literacy, including:

  • use the computer for drafting, revising, responding, and editing.
  • employ research strategies using electronic databases
  • conduct web-based research and the evaluate online sources
  • understand the difference in rhetorical strategies used in writing traditional and hyper-text prose/graphics.

Okay. I'm going to set aside the strange language of describing this as a "techno-plank," and move straight to the fact that there are 3 big advantages to posting this in blogspace. First, it allows for the posting of comments. Second, given the right platform, it would allow interested parties to subscribe to an RSS feed of the follow-up comments, rather than having to visit the page repeatedly. Third, placing it online allows for links to be placed to the WPA homepage and/or the original Outcomes Statement to which this is intended as an addition.

Color me nitpicky, but this page only manages one of three. On the third point, I tend to remember URLs, but otherwise, I would have had to look it up, and from the homepage, the Outcomes Statement is 2 levels in, and that's if you're lucky enough to guess that it's in the WPA Guide, and then that it can be found among the WPA Position Statements and Resolutions. It's all but buried in the site. Frankly, that's too much work to accomplish what seems to me to be a pretty natural task request--the ability to access the larger document of which this may soon be a part. The page accomplishes the 1st advantage, and I can understand why the 2nd wouldn't be seized upon--it's a fine point and requires more familiarity with blog platforms than most of my colleagues probably possess. The third point, however, is pretty basic and reasonable.

But that's just form, you might argue. At least it's up there. And yes, I agree--it is up there. So let's turn to the statement itself. Some of my exasperation with the statement is mitigated by the purpose of the OS in general: "These statements describe only what we expect to find at the end of first-year composition, at most schools a required general education course or sequence of courses." In other words, I understand the problems that "outcomes" present, having written a few in the course of my own career. And yet.

It says something, I think, that the OS in general strongly asserts the importance of expertise and authority, while this technology statement's overwhelming tone is one of apology and qualification. The OS explains that "th[is] document is not merely a compilation or summary of what currently takes place," but rather an attempt to "regularize" expectations. In other words, the document makes some room for asserting goals rather than simply reflecting a status quo. And if my impressions of how this document is typically deployed are correct, then its primary audience is administrative.

Then why would it begin with a statement about why it should be ignored? This self-refutation takes up nearly 50% of the statement itself, and basically allows an audience to dismiss it. We all know that access is uneven. What we all don't seem to know is that access to literacy is similarly uneven. "[T]hose who are lower in the socioeconomic spectrum of society" are also likely to have more trouble accomplishing the goals of the main OS, but this isn't posed as the sizable obstacle that it is here.

The second objection? I don't really know what that means, although I suppose there are hints below: uncritical appears to involve "using technology for its own sake (and for the sake of those who sell it)." If I wanted to get really snarky about this, I'd talk about how many textbooks (themselves a technology) are assigned for their own sake (and never or rarely used) and/or for the sake of those who sell (and/or write) them. Maybe the parenthetical above is a swipe at the class-in-a-box people, but it's a little ironic that it's just as applicable to the class-in-a-book people.

So how bout we start this statement with the kind of positive, assertive statement that chracterizes the main OS? Something like:

Although writing has a long and varied history, as we enter the 21st century, it is essential that we recognize the crucial connection between writing and information technologies. Computers are no longer (if they ever were) souped-up typewriters; the Web and the Internet more broadly have transformed writing at a fundamental level. As a result, responsibly designed writing courses, at every level, can no longer afford to ignore technology.

I like that a lot better, but then, I'm not a WPA. To my mind, in a document for administrators, the "foremost problem" shouldn't be either of the two offered. I would add a paragraph to the end of the statement explaining that resources and training, for teachers, are a vital part of supporting these outcomes. I would cast this as an ongoing investment for which the outcomes are the reward. But that's me. I'm pretty sure that whatever "uncritical" actually means, it has more to do with a lack of pedagogical support than it does with teachers shilling for companies.

(btw, "on the other hand" students "are more employable"?? That is the only statement of technology's value in this entire document. Wow. That's really really weak. Really. And no, the main OS doesn't "justify" writing, but it also doesn't undercut it.)

The specific outcomes are pretty vanilla, although I would argue that they were no less true back in 1996 than they are today. Is it possible to bring them forward without dipping into specifics that might become obsolete a year or two down the line?

"use the computer for drafting, revising, responding, and editing"--it's hard for me to imagine that this is actually necessary any longer, but oh well. It would have been a goal rather than a baseline minimum back in 1986. I'd prefer to see something about multiple platforms (including word processors) used in the composing process.

"employ research strategies using electronic databases"--odd phrasing. Employ strategies using the databases? How about developing an awareness of the variety of search strategies made possible by the combination of physical and electronic information sources?

"conduct web-based research and the evaluate online sources"--I'm not sure why this and #2 are separate. Far as I can tell, they're the same outcome with different sites. Unless we're going to indulge the assumption that nothing is published and available in a database that needs evaluating with the same "critical" eye. Nope. We're not. Combine these two.

"understand the difference in rhetorical strategies used in writing traditional and hyper-text prose/graphics."--Okay, this is fugly. First of all, false binary. Second of all, "hyper-text"?? Qu'est-ce que c'est? Third of all, "prose/graphics"? How about an awareness of the effect that media have upon rhetorical strategies, preferably achieved through the production of a varied range of texts (look under Processes in the main OS, and you'll see that this is already there, btw.)?

So far, I've just taken what they've offered and revised. Do I have a wishlist? Oh yes:

  • Some appreciation/understanding of the rhetorical impact of design in various media
  • Some introduction to the cultural impact of technology in particular venues
  • Some experience with social software, whether it be email lists, MOOs, MMORPGs, blogs, wikis, social bookmarking, facebook, myspace, etc.

That's top of my head stuff, but I'm sure if pressed I could generate others. There's the problem of outcomes statements, of course, but surely we could be asking a little more than this document currently does. And we could be apologizing for it a little less. Prefacing an outcomes statement with the reasons why it's problematic just strikes me as self-defeating.

And while all this certainly sounds like I don't appreciate the work that undoubtedly went into this statement, that wouldn't be correct. I recognize how tough stuff like this is, but I think it's also important to realize the opportunity that it represents, and that opportunity isn't served well by some of what appears there.

That's all. I hope that the conversation that ensues at the WPAC next week is productive.

Update: the 4th advantage of blogspace is trackbacking, so that long-ass, windy rants like mine can be recorded on the site itself. Oh well. Maybe I'll leave a comment there, pointing.

Update 2: I forgot to link to Jeff's comments about the TOS, which prompted me to look at the thing in the first place. D'oh.

9 Comments

I think you put into words a lot of the feelings I had upon reading the statement. Why, oh why, yet another apology for technology. I don't really open and follow the discussions on WPA-L but have a lurking sense that part of the question related to a technology plank revolves around whether one is even necessary. I would have to say that, if the plank is couched as justificatory like this, then no--no necessary. Your tack of pitching the positives make so much more sense.

I'm glad you followed up with some tangible suggestions. Dump the apologetic preamble. Yes. Revise the outcomes already there. I like your suggestions. The drafting , editing, and revising is 1998. Either dump it or do something like understand the relationships between writing technologies and composing processes. Your research revision helps a lot. I might also add an IP or use of materials angle. The traditional vs hypertext has to go--your revision again makes a ton of sense.

I think it's good to be as helpful as possible here. I'd like to take up the second issue of venues/technologies for working out the statement. Make a comment and a link, but it would be fittingly telling (1. if this conversation (and I know Jeff has posted on this too) played out in the culural space of the second Web (this space characterized by a "critical" set up and use of technology, but more important, a vital instantiated social network), while (2. the OS plank posted to the same space lay more or less dormant.

"That's top of my head stuff, but I'm sure if pressed I could generate others. There's the problem of outcomes statements, of course, but surely we could be asking a little more than this document currently does. And we could be apologizing for it a little less. Prefacing an outcomes statement with the reasons why it's problematic just strikes me as self-defeating."

You may have seen the rant on my blog regarding this statement - you have taken a nicer route of critique. But this quote I take from you speaks to your own critique. What you call "apologizing" I call "clinging" to 80s ideas (access, for one) as well as common cliches (paying attention, critical thinking, etc). Overall, however, I don't know of any evidence that Outcomes, like other administrative loves - placement testing, the division of composition into basic and fyc, etc - do anything. As much as I admire and like many of the writers of the technology statement, I think these acts have little to do with bettering student education and more to do with other issues. In the end, the effort falls flat and those who actually teach with technology and are thinking through the problems/benefits technology poses for writing are ignored.

Thanks for the quick comments, guys. Jeff, your original rant was what prompted me to look at it in the first place--I just forgot to add a link...

And yeah, I don't know that this kind of document does a whole lot other than piss us off. With the tech changing so quickly, a doc that tries to pose "what we can agree on and assert" may just be rolling the boulder uphill.

But now I can move to other boulders...heh.

More formal complaints: Blogger is barely a weblog. Comments don't have dates: only times. That's a big problem. How about WordPress or using the new Drupal thingee on the WPA Counci server?

Jeff, I think the simpering and hedging Collin identifies is part of the reason outcomes statements don't do anything. The endless modal verbs encourage administrators (from WPAs to deans to provosts) to blow 'em off. I think a lot of people would argue that this makes for the widest possible application (the statement can be used at two-year colleges, liberal arts institutions, and research universities). Maybe, but can't that be done without making the "outcomes" minimal differences from the status quo? Without lowering expectations and apologizing for saying, "Hey, we gotta own up!"

And this kind of apologizing is deeply embedded in English studies, not only in outcomes statements, but in syllabi, grading, relations with other departments, essays, etc.

So, I guess Bradley's pointing to the minimal differences and owning up raises a question for me. What is it that would make a technology outcome different from just an outcome that a writing program might desire? I see the broader outcomes as more or less reflecting the state of knowledge for mainstream writing studies--rhetoric, writing process, social contexts--the core in thinking and talking points. So, what points might technology-focused practitioners offer instead? Or, just how should technology outcomes be cultivated if they are not simply folded into the broader WP culture and what modal statements would we push? Technlogy can . . .

generate writing that is co-authored and shared in its production

support writing that is experimental, provisional

promote the mixing of forms and genres

. . . not likely to appeal much to administrators, but I get the sense that people are thinking that anything that would appeal to administrators could pretty much be folded into the broader statement.

Dan:
". . . not likely to appeal much to administrators,"

Here is another key problem. Too much time spent appealing to administrators, not enough time spent appealing to ourselves or educating ourselves.

Do we really need "outcomes?" That's a serious question. And I think if one quickly says, "of course," one might not be thinking long enough about the question. Why do we need outcomes. Standardization? Have we not learned this lesson yet regarding writing. Tayorlism is dead. Let's give up on it already. Writing can not be and has not been standardized.

So we have goals? A worthwhile point, but also quite redundant. Why would we not have goals already?

To prove what we do has value? This is a self-esteem issue and too problematic to be reduced to a piece of paper handed over to the Dean or chair of the dept.

So why does one need a statement like an outcomes statement, for or not for technology?

Sometimes, it sounds like outcomes are based on a logic of "not knowing" or being "uninformed." If that is the case, if we are working on an uninformed model all the time, we are in serious trouble.

Collin, I'm going to use your blog to talk to a bunch o' folks re the techo plank, including you. I hope that's ok?

A couple of things.

One is that while I agree with you and others re the blog and the WPA sites, I'm grateful that someone else did set something up ;) Something *is* better than nothing.

Two is that we really aren't done with our thinking on this: eg, please see what I posted yesterday, the two documents especially, which together address many of the complaints expressed here, for example the statement from the math folks, who find that (like writing), math isn't math any longer without digital technology. At the same time, what I'd really like to see in some preface is something speaking to the fact that writing--from petroglyphs to MOOs--has always been informed, enabled, constrained etc by technology, and that some of the innovations in technology have dramatic, even tranformative impact (some might even say along the lines of tectonic plates ;) That's what's happened in the last 20 years imho.

Three, however, is that what any one of us or any community might want has to be in dialogue with a bigger picture. I'd like to see something along the lines of re-mixing included, for example, but at the same time, I'm doing an analysis of writing programs, based on how they represent themselves on the web, and I can tell you that in general and in this context, re-mixing refers not to composing but to a technology used to make cakes. Seriously, in a review of some 50 programs so far, two (that's 2!) of them even mention digital technology, and it's in reference to one of your favorite course management systems. All of which is to say that there's still plenty of work to be done.

My hope, as you all know (and I know you know this) is that a revision to the WPA Outcomes Statement can move this work along. But I know that this will be slower and different than many (probably including me) hope for.

To the extent, however, that you all participate in this effort--as advocates or critics or both--it will move along more swiftly and in a more informed way.

For this, many thanks.

kathleen yancey

Kathi:
You write,
"re-mixing refers not to composing but to a technology used to make cakes"

So how will an outcomes statement change that?

I don't think it will. The reason(s) why a teacher at any level would say remixing is about making cakes and not about a long standing practice of reusing and appropriating ideas and writings for new purposes is going to be too complex to solve in a statement, no?

The reasons are going to be based on ideology, education, exposure to new and different ideas, and so on.

I agree that "there is plenty of work to be done" but I wonder if an outcomes statement will push any of this work along. When I go to Dan's blog and read about his teaching with podcasts and movies, for instance, I'm not under the impression that an outcomes statement moved his teaching in that direction. I'm under the impression that other forces contributed to his pedagogy.

Hey Jeff~~

Back atcha below . . .

Kathi:
You write,
"re-mixing refers not to composing but to a technology used to make cakes"

So how will an outcomes statement change that?

*well, not overnight: that's clear. But I do think that (too) slowly, it will, in part because of documents like the WPA Outcomes Statement, in part because of legislation, in part because of discussions across the academy, in part because of the practices our students bring with them to college. So a lot of in parts.


I don't think it will. The reason(s) why a teacher at any level would say remixing is about making cakes and not about a long standing practice of reusing and appropriating ideas and writings for new purposes is going to be too complex to solve in a statement, no?

*of course. No magic wand here.


The reasons are going to be based on ideology, education, exposure to new and different ideas, and so on.

*yup.


I agree that "there is plenty of work to be done" but I wonder if an outcomes statement will push any of this work along.

*Obviously, I hope it will.

When I go to Dan's blog and read about his teaching with podcasts and movies, for instance, I'm not under the impression that an outcomes statement moved his teaching in that direction. I'm under the impression that other forces contributed to his pedagogy.

*LOL. Hard to argue with this, yes ;) Folks like Dan push the field; statements like this can push it as well. Both matter.

I might add that in the late 90's/early 21st century, Dan's colleagues at Chapel Hill did refer to the WPA Outcomes Statements when they reviewed the gen ed program. Which brings up another point: a document like this articulates what we (and it's a large we) believe; it represents us; it shapes the future; and it connects us to others. Admittedly, that's a lot of weight for single document to carry, and that too, I sense, is part of the frustration that this kind of doc can evoke. There's almost no way it can't do but disappoint.

Still, I'm happier with this kind of document representing our work than allowing others to define it for us--which is what happens all too often imho.

k

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