Creating a Writing Center: Autonomy, Interdependence,and Identity

Learning to write is an elusive goal for many. A key pedagogical issue has been whether writers improve better through direct feedback or through socially supportive environments (Zimmerman, 1998). Either way, writers improve through self- awareness of their own processes. Developing awareness is directly related to developing autonomy and this is at the core of the first student-run Writing Center at an American university in Japan (hereafter AUJ).