Good morning, UCWbLers and other writing-loving friends! Now that the autumn quarter is in full swing, we asked one of our new UCWbL writing tutors and graduate assistants, Marcela Z., to write a little about her experience so far with the UCWbL!
First I was afraid, I was petrified, I thought I’d never understand what the UCWbL’s all about, the amount of things that it involves and how many people it helps through such different paths.
It was an overwhelming and full of excitement beginning indeed. I have never been a tutor, until now, except for teaching my daughter, which I never considered as a tutoring task but one of my maternal duties, so you can imagine how I felt as I began to dive into the UCWbL’s mission and believes.
Thankfully, now that I have been able to see below the surface and start to put into practice all the things we’ve been studying and reading, my fears are changing into joy, not only because I finally understood it, but also because it is an amazing experience to collaborate and work together with all kinds of writers in all kinds of writing projects.
One of the things I’m very happy about is the continued learning opportunity this represents, not only for writers, but also for tutors. Each meeting is a collaborative job between both of them, where an interchange of knowledge takes place.
The fact that the tutoring sessions are held in such a friendly environment helps the writers feel comfortable and open to suggestions, but at the same time invites them to come up with their own conclusions and, therefore, leads them to trust their writing process.
At the same time, the tutor learns that every writer is different, although most of their concerns might be the same, and this will improve its teaching skills as he would have to find the best way to reach out for each particular writer so they both find the path to improve not only the writing task in front of them, but the writer skills too.
Over these couple of weeks as a new UCWbLer I have found myself submerged in a lot of information and I can say that I’m very impressed about how well organized and practical everything is, but I’m even more impressed about all the good nature people I have found. It’s not easy to find people willing to guide you in every step of the road and even wait for you while you tie your shoes or need to make a pause to take some air.