The Chronicle: Colloquy: Responses

Students (especially undergraduate students) who have a desire and/or a need to write should absolutely be encouraged. There are fewer students every year who understand the purpose of a semicolon or that a dash is not a substitute for a comma or period. Sometimes my heart bleeds when working with students on revising their papers, not because their spelling is terrible and their punctuation nonexistent, but because their vocabulary is so incredibly limited they are unable to express themselves. Perhaps these "workshop" courses will create a fire in their bellies which will drive them toward an understanding of themselves, their own and their classmates' writing. Hopefully, from there these fledgling writers will leap to "real" literature.

I think that those teachers who want these inquiring minds to "read more literature now" rather than attempt to create meaningful words themselves may be trying to ensure that their classes make. I don't deny that sharing one's own viewpoints on life with adoring neophytes can be very satisfying; however, acting as a "life coach" to young people searching for their own beliefs and inate creativity is not only wonderfully exhililarating on a personal level, but offers the opportunity to assist in bringing something marvelous and long lasting to the world.

Don't crush creativity in its infancy, encourage it, celebrate it, learn from it.

: -- Trisha Taylor, Valdosta State University (posted 3/12, 3:30 p.m., U.S. Eastern time)

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