Welcome to Winter 121B!  Expository Writing: Issues in Equal Access to Education

Please note, there is a service learning commitment for 121 classes:  In addition to class attendance, course expectations include a twenty-hour minimum engagement in serving schools and organizations involved in the roadmap project.

Class Theme:  Equal Access to Education—“Every Child College Bound”

Instructor:  Carol Robertson

Classroom: Savery Hall, Rm 156, M/W 8:30-10:20 am

Office:  Padelford, B5F; however, office hours will be in Odegaard 326

Office hours:  Monday, 10:30-12:30 pm:  Odegaard 326 and by appointment.

Class website:   https://canvas.uw.edu/courses

Email: carolr3@u.washington.edu                                                                                                                                                   

The shared goal of Expository Writing courses is to launch you into a successful academic experience at UW by preparing you for the rigorous demands of university writing. This course, however, offers something to write about! Our class will focus on issues related to educational equity and includes a service-learning commitment which will give you an opportunity to serve in local schools and organizations connected with the Road Map Project, a project whose motto is "Every student college bound." Preparing students to be tutors and mentors, we will discuss the factors that contribute to the academic success of students who are of low socio-economic status, who are first in their family to attend college, who are multilingual, or who have attended comparatively under-resourced schools.  

Since reading critically leads to better writing, our sequence will begin by exploring and analyzing the rhetorical strategies of skilled writers and speakers who wrote in different contexts and to different audiences. As the quarter continues, we will practice the written formation of our own analytic and persuasive arguments, and in a highly interactive classroom environment, we will examine the depth, significance, and support of the arguments we construct. The course sequence will include six short assignments and two major papers, culminating in a portfolio, which demonstrates competency as writers. In these writings, we will consider factors which promote individual academic success, examine and research issues concerning equity in education, and reflect and draw upon individual experiences as laborers in the field.