Writing Center Employment

The Learning, Teaching, and Research Center’s (LTRC) mission includes “helping students realize their academic potential and achieve their educational goals.” Our offices seek to bind the values of equity, inclusion, and belonging within the ongoing work of deepening faculty and student capacity for effective teaching and transformative learning.

The Writing Center is a component of the LTRC. We employ undergraduate peer consultants to provide literacy support to thousands of Vassar students while maintaining a thriving community of readers, educators, and writers from across the curriculum.

Writing Center consultants help readers, writers, and speakers hone their craft. In one-to-one and small-group sessions, consultants offer descriptive, revision-based feedback on any project from any discipline at any stage of the writing process. We model effective reading strategies, cultivate rhetorical awareness, and encourage articulate expression while focusing on the writer’s long-term development.

In addition to individual feedback sessions, consultants design and lead small group workshops and facilitate reading circles. Staff members also participate in professional development activities such as orientation, observations, and staff meetings.

Qualifications

All peer consultants have completed their First-Year Writing Seminar and are eager to continue improving their literacy and teaching skills through peer consulting.

Consultants are curious readers and generous listeners with a respect for and interest in others’ academic development. Our work is primarily collaborative; therefore, the ability to pose provocative rhetorical and craft-based questions and to facilitate respectful, rigorous intellectual exchange is essential.

Consultants should be willing to work afternoon, evening, and weekend hours, as well as actively participate in professional development activities. 

Diversity of perspectives is important to us; we strongly encourage students from all backgrounds and disciplines to apply.

Application Materials & Deadline

To apply for Writing Center employment, please submit the following materials to Dr. Schultz as a single PDF document via email by the final Friday in April:

1. Cover Letter that discusses your interest in peer-consulting and any relevant experience;
2. Résumé or CV; and
3. Argument-based writing sample of at least 1,250 words.

For full consideration, all materials must be received by the final Friday in April. Applicants are welcome to visit the Writing Center to speak with a peer-consultant about working in the Center and job responsibilities in advance of applying. You may also seek feedback on your application materials from the Writing Center staff. Applicants selected for interviews will be notified within two weeks. Final hiring decisions will be made during exam week in May. If you have any questions, please email Dr. Schultz, Director of the Writing Center: maschultz@vassar.edu.