Actually, peer consultants can do some things teachers can't. 1.Writing is a process, not just a product. The polished draft is only the end result, and how you get there is as important as where you end up. Good writers are good, not because they sit down and write effortlessly, turning out beautiful sentences without sweat. They are good because they believe that eventually, after lots of work and time and discarded drafts, they will come up with something worth a reader's attention.
Writing is social.
You may feel you have to be alone to write, and this may be physically true. Your writing will not be complete until it has reached, physically and intellectually, the reader or readers for whom it was intended. Writing is self-taught. You learn to write by doing it, not by listening to somebody tell you about it. Writing is a process.