ABSTRACT

Some writing centers begin because the faculty initiates the idea; others exist because the administrators have hired someone to start them. Does it make a difference how they begin, or are other factors more important in the successes and/or problems in writing centers? In 1981, I started a secondary school writing center in a public school; ten years later, I created another center in an independent school. The public school, Red Bank Regional High School in Little Silver, New Jersey, served a diverse population of approximately eleven hun.. dred students in grades 9-12. The McCallie School in Chattanooga, Tennessee, a boys' col.. lege preparatory daylboarding institution, serves a somewhat less diverse population of approximately six hundred students in the Upper School (grades 9-12). Even though the ac.. ademic levels varied more in the public school, both schools regularly have National Merit Scholars. Having designed a writing center from the bottom up at the public school, I had discovered the pros and cons of creating one that ran well on minimal funding through sev.. eral departments, yet applied writing center pedagogy within an existing institutional struc.. ture. The writing center I began in 1991 in an independent school, however, was funded through an alumni endowment supported by the administration, so the ways ofapplying sim.. ilar pedagogical ideas within the existing institution were impacted by the reaction to an ad.. ministrative mandate. Although the specific institutions differ in some ways, there are similarities in the ways that a writing center administrator can deal with writing centers that start from the bottom up or the top down.