Shared Text Project
In 2002, the First-Year Writing Program instituted a Shared Text Project. The purpose of the Shared Text Project was to provide first-year students with a common reading experience as part of their college eduction and to provide them with opportunities to meet writers from different professional backgrounds. Over the past decade, the Shared Text Project has been included as part of ENGL 1101 and ENGL 1102, but currently it is featured only as part of ENGL 1102 (Introduction to Literature) during the spring semester.
Writers and works that have been part of Shared Text Project have included
Z.Z Packer, Drinking Coffee Elsewhere
Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried
Julia Alvarez, In the Time of Butterflies
Support for the Shared Text Project is based on
- National movement toward common text(s) for first-year students to create sense of community and a common knowledge base that can be assumed by all faculty;
- UWG’s movement toward Learning Communities, programs to enhance retention, strengthen core curriculum;
- Opportunity to expose students to a writer of renown and to create artistic events on campus;
- Create more substance for workshops and mentoring experiences;
- Train students to read, analyze, and write about a full-length work by a single author (“Basic Skills” section of core); and
- Support writing-across-the-curriculum by engaging faculty in other disciplines in the subject matter of the shared text(s)