The college I attend has an "English Proficiency Exam" that must be passed before a student is allowed to graduate. Students are given two hours to write a 500-word essay on a given topic. Students here have historically had trouble with this exam, which they are supposed to be prepared for after taking two freshman English courses. The problem has led to the development of an additional pass/fail English course for which no credit is given to the student, but which counts as passing the proficiency exam if he/she does well enough. Students still fail this course in almost as many numbers as those who take the exam. Why?

The new coordinator of the Campus Advisement and Tutorial Services center came in to the Writing Center I work at last week, and asked,

"If I bring in a student who, say, needs help with gerunds, just gerunds, can you provide them with practice and instruction?"

I told her that in general, no. The Writing Center is supposed to be a place where students come and get help with their essays or reports for any stage of the writing process, not grammar instruction. She got angry:

"My students aren't at essay-writing level yet! How can they write essays if they don't have the grammatical skills to write with?"

"If they aren't at essay-writing level yet, then they should be in the remedial courses."

"They ARE in the remedial courses...but they're learning how to write paragraphs. The courses don't cover basic grammar; they cover basic writing. What about all of the freshmen who don't even have basic grammar skills?"

The obvious answer to this question? The high schools need to do a better job. A possible college-level intervention? Offer a much more remedial English course than the one already offered, or much more remedial content. The solution chosen by a community college strapped for cash and low on faculty and facilities? Put the job on the writing tutors: student employees getting $8-$9 an hour. It's not fair, though the tutors generally don't complain because they are people who love to help out. Still, it's not right that college students are picking up the pieces where high school teachers have failed. It's not right that students are graduating high school thinking that they are equipped for the world and college when they are not. It's not right that even remedial courses designed to teach high school content is not enough to help high school graduates. Where has the writing instruction gone?

Dedicated teachers are the key, but most good teachers flock to places that pay and treat teachers better. All the less economically well-off areas, well, they sometimes get lucky with a few passionate individuals who don't mind the low pay and lack of facilities, but for the most part the students at these schools are in families that can only afford the local community college, and when the high schools can't do their jobs due to lack of resources, the community college or whomever they designate winds up picking up the pieces.

Learn more about this author, Shannon Burton.
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