Developments at the South Hadley High School Writing Center

By Allyson LaForge

Edited by Lauren Quirici

The South Hadley Writing Center was started when Ariel Lanz and Julia Herman, both Mount Holyoke students of the class of 2013, decided they wanted to establish a writing center at South Hadley High School in response to the suicide of Phoebe Prince in 2010. Their goal was to foster a connection between the South Hadley community and Mount Holyoke, as well as to create an academic project to diversify the sports culture at the high school and provide an avenue for students to learn about the college process. The South Hadley High Writing Center opened in 2011 under the supervision of Ted McCarthy, former vice principal of South Hadley High, and Alan Bloomgarden, of the Mount Holyoke CBL program.

During the past semester, I have worked at the center with Ami Terachi, class of 2013.  My role in our project is to teach a peer-mentoring course to high school sophomores, juniors, or seniors, as well as to help supervise the current mentors as they work with students inside the classroom.

As a senior at Milford High School in New Hampshire, I proposed a writing center to the faculty as a part of my final project for the National Honor Society.   Having worked on a similar project before, my interest was sparked when I heard about the South Hadley High Writing Center. My passion for this project comes not only from my commitment to bringing writing centers to high schools, but also from my interest in the idea of literacy and writing as products of culture, rather than ability. As a teacher, I hope to help student mentors realize the importance of diversity in the classroom and to broaden their conception of the writing process. 

At the beginning of the semester, our goals were to revitalize the South Hadley Writing Center in order to streamline its function, as well as to publicize the center to the larger student body. At the beginning of the year, the center worked much like Mount Holyoke’s SAW Center. Students who wished to be mentored could make appointments or come by during drop-in hours. However, unlike at the SAW Center, the majority of students were not compelled to use the Writing Center as a resource.  We wanted to fix this problem, as well as to provide ongoing education to current mentors so that they could work effectively in the Writing Center.

Over the semester, Ami and I have transitioned the current peer mentors from working “drop-in” hours to working with teachers in specific classes, much like the course mentors the SAW Center provides to first-year seminars at Mount Holyoke. Although this has been largely successful, the high school has unfortunately decided to discontinue the peer mentoring course next semester due to scheduling concerns and time constraints. It will be replaced by a Writing Summit put on by the high school faculty for peer mentors and students. However, the model of classroom mentoring that we developed over the year will continue, which is a huge accomplishment.

Our biggest challenge this semester was communication with the high school. Two transitions in leadership, one at South Hadley when the Writing Center received a new supervisor, and one at Mount Holyoke when Ami and I replaced Julia and Ariel, contributed to the difficulties.  Additionally, Ami and I encountered multiple time constraints as we tried to juggle teaching a new course on top of our own classes and schoolwork.

Over the semester, Ami and I adapted the peer mentoring course to reflect our changes to the model of the Writing Center, and to include more material on diversity within the high school to make the peer mentoring theory more applicable to students. We also made sure to listen to the expectations our students had. When we learned that they were hoping to improve their own writing in addition to learning about peer mentoring theory, we adapted the course assignments. For example, the majority of the students this semester were seniors applying to college. To help them with this process, we had them write personal essays, and then revise them to reflect the feedback they received.

In addition to confidence in my own ability to problem-solve and self-advocate, both of which equip me for the “real world”, I have developed a passion for teaching. I’ve also realized how important it is to for me to continue learning about writing in the context of history. One of the most difficult weeks Ami and I had was when we taught about linguistic diversity, using Lee A. Tonouchi’s “Da State of Pidgin Address” and Gloria Anzaldúa’s “How to Tame a Wild Tongue.” The idea of linguistic imperialism was a new concept for students, and it was hard to convey the importance of these readings when they had so little background in the study of colonialism. It was frustrating to hear them say that they didn’t think it was important to read these essays, but it also helped me realize how important it was to continue learning and teaching about these subjects.