Reasoning the Need: Graduate Education and Basic Writing

Abstract

While college composition theory/pedagogy courses are standard offerings in composition and rhetoric graduate programs, specialized basic writing graduate courses lag behind. At the same time, there is a pressing need for highly qualified teachers of nontraditional adult students, especially in community college and adult literacy education programs. This need has recently been articulated in two official statements from the Two-Year College Association of NCTE. It is also being realized by the efforts of individual professors who have collectively offered at least nineteen such courses in recent years. A second argument for offering more BW graduate courses is the extensive BW scholarship revealed by such publications as The Bedford Guide for Teachers of Basic Writing, 2nd ed. (Adler-Kassner and Glau) and Teaching Developmental Writing: Background Readings, 3rd ed. (Bernstein). This essay argues that graduate programs should augment current commitments to preparing graduate students to teach, research, and administer programs for nontraditional adult students by regularly offering courses on basic writing theory, research, and pedagogy.