STUDENT FEEDBACK

COMMENTS FROM CREATIVE WRITING STUDENTS

“I thought Laura was an excellent teacher and recommended that my friends take a class with her. She motivated us to step outside of our comfort zones safely and truly fostered an excellent learning environment. I hope to take a class with her again in the future.”

“Laura was very nice to meet with me outside her office hours to help me many times. She worked around my schedule. I really like the comfortable discussion atmosphere. She is very funny and lets us put a lot of insight into how the class is facilitated. I had a wonderful time.”

“This class was excellent. The readings were varied enough for everyone to have one/week that they liked. I feel that the workshops were the heart of the course and they helped me a great deal—as well as the focus on revision as a main way to vary my writing.”

“This was by far one of the most enjoyable classes I’ve taken at University so far. Laura is an excellent instructor who always finds time to help me outside of class.”

“Workshops and your comments in conferences were most helpful—but more so your enthusiasm/encouragement approaching my writing and in class everyday.”

COMMENTS FROM COMPOSITION STUDENTS

“I began writing my first draft, using many of the points and examples I had written in my outline. However, after meeting with you, Laura, I realized that was all my paper had, good points. There was no logical argument. Up until now, especially in high school, I think I used solely sophisticated points and somehow managed to never truly construct a full paper argument. With this paper I’ve finally stepped up…”

“I learned many skills from my first paper and I really incorporated them into this paper. I wrote many drafts in this paper. I kept brainstorming and even during my writing the first draft I stopped and decided to take it in a new direction. Writing an outline also helped me not only organize my paper, but make sure all the paragraphs fit my thesis…Finally, I read my paper, and then read it out loud…I took a lot from writing this paper and I hope this trend continues. I feel like I am starting to finally come into my own as a writer.”

“Needing some help, I went to talk with you at your office. As you know, we spent a lot of time just looking at the picture. You asked me a lot of questions about what I saw. And not just questions about what the objects are, but also about the way things appear and feel to me. It was all those “why” questions that I think helped me the most. They made me ask myself, ‘Well, why is it there?’ and questions like that. At the time I left your office, I was still a little confused and was unsure of the direction of my paper. When I went home, I just tried to continue asking myself the questions you were asking me. Eventually, after staring at the painting for even longer, I began to figure out what I wanted to argue.”