Policies | Writing Center

Before your appointment with a writing center consultant on any campus or online, please review the following information and policies regarding appointments.

Appointments

Writing Process – Writing consultants assist with any type of writing in any discipline and at any phase of the writing process, from brainstorming and drafting to reviewing and polishing.
Collaboration – Writing consultants will work alongside students to address important writing concerns, learn new skills and strategies, as well as access helpful resources, but they will not simply proofread or edit papers for students.
Conduct – Students should behave in a professional and courteous manner both in person and online. Anyone who violates this may have their Writing Center privileges revoked. Consultants may end or leave sessions if a student is violating our policies or the UM Creed. Students must be wearing appropriate attire when participating in online appointments. Students should dress in a manner that would be considered appropriate to attend class.
Number of Reservations – Students can schedule up to 2 appointments per day and 3 appointments per week. Students may elect to have a 30 minute or 1 hour face to face appointment. All online appointments are scheduled in 1 hour blocks and last for 45 minutes.
Longer Writing Projects – Due to time constraints and the high volume of appointments, consultants may not be able to review an entire draft of a paper if it exceeds 1500-2000 words (about 5 double spaced pages). If you are working on a longer writing project, you should plan to make multiple appointments and to point out specific areas of concern that you would like the consultant to prioritize in their review.
Scheduling/Staffing – Occasionally, administrators may need to adjust appointments to accommodate change in consultants’ schedules. We reserve the right to reassign a consultation/appointment to another staff member working at the same time without notice. However, we will not change the time or date of an appointment without first reaching out and making alternate arrangements with a student-client.

Writing Center Values and Professional Environment

The Writing Center cultivates an environment that promotes inclusion, integrity, and safety. We ask that you respect all writing consultants and observe professionalism at all times when speaking with consultants about your work.
Harassment of any kind will result in a suspension of Writing Center privileges and/or the filing of a report with relevant University of Mississippi offices, including the Title IX Office, the Office of Academic Integrity, the UM Police Department, and the Dean of Students Office.
We understand that using the Writing Center may result in the formation of friendships between peers and we think that’s great. However, it is our policy that writing consultants not share their personal contact information with student clients when working in an official capacity at the center. Personal contact information may include personal email addresses, social media account information, personal phone numbers, or other personal contact information.

Academic Integrity

Students should be actively engaged during Writing Center appointments since the goal for appointments is to think critically and reflectively about writing assignments and to actively consider changes that may improve the rhetorical effectiveness of students’ work.
Asking a writing consultant to write part of a paper (or an entire paper), to participate in acts of deception regarding the authenticity of a piece of writing, or to knowingly participate in misleading a faculty member or another tutor will result in immediate suspension of Writing Center privileges and the submission of a report to the Academic Integrity Office. A breach of academic integrity, under any and all circumstances, will not be tolerated.
Students can only make appointments for their own writing projects. Students cannot reserve appointments on behalf of other people (friends or family). Students can make appointments in groups for collaborative projects or designate a group leader to visit the Writing Center on behalf of the group. Please contact the WC director on your campus for more information about services for collaborative writing projects.
Students may request that an appointment verification email be sent to their instructor. These verification emails are always sent directly to the instructor’s official email and will not be provided to the student in writing/hard copy. Students can access and view their own reports/activity with the Writing Center by logging into their scheduler account.