“Mentorship, Affordability, and Equity: Ways Forward in Writing Program Administration”

by Amanda Presswood and Virginia M. Schwarz, Writing Program Administrators Graduate Organization (WPA-GO) | Xchanges 15.1, Spring 2020

Moving Forward Together

As we conclude, we’d like to return to the questions we posed at the beginning of this piece that we hope can be productive for readers:

• How does a graduate organization with practices reified over time respond meaningfully to calls for change?
• How might graduate organizations also advocate for change within the parent organization and the field at large?
• Finally, how might members interrogate their own practices and constantly push their organizations forward in developing new practices that serve a range of graduate students and interests?

For WPA-GO, identifying openings for incremental change in the following areas has improved the organization and partially addressed, however incomplete, inequalities in Rhet-Comp graduate programs: mentorship and support, conference affordability, and equity-centered approaches to assessment. These have been areas of growth and growing for the organization and for many of its members. Change requires elected leadership and members to identify and challenge processes that are no longer (or never have) served them or the organization. And moving forward—that is, moving forward differently—can be complicated, uncomfortable, and risky. One takeaway for Amanda is that while change may be risky, new practices are necessary if we are to meet the needs of the graduate students that our organizations are there to support. Advocacy and equity-centered approaches need to be woven into the fabric of our organizations, not mere afterthoughts. Virginia believes that change needs to be planned for and facilitated through organizational documents and structures, and organizations should have frameworks for accountability. Advocacy and equity work also need to be transparent to all members, and everyone should be included in decisions about where the organization grows, moves, and changes.