The Writing Center is a place that foregrounds conversations among writers about writing. Students meet with peer consultants, who are other student-writers, not authority figures who have all the answers. Consultants model a problem solving writing process based on their own successful experiences as writers. The recently approved strategic plan for the CFA undergraduate curriculum, Arts Curriculum 2001, emphasizes the centrality of oral and written communication skills to the career needs of all CFA students. Through our own writing we organize our thoughts, make connections, develop our ideas, and communicate with and reach out to others.
Writing is a social process.
Resumes, book reviews, historical analyses, grant proposals, and other types of writing are all written for an audience and with certain goals in mind. As is true of all the fine arts, writing is both craft and art. As craft, writing demands skills and approaches that need to be learned, practiced, and honed. Any actor, choreographer, filmmaker, musician, or other artist knows the endless time and effort that goes into learning a craft and then preparing a performance or putting together a production that will, in the end, appear spontaneous and cohesive. Hard working Fred Astaire remarked that he practiced a routine for hundreds of hours so it would appear effortless.