Design Discourse - Composing and Revising Programs in Professional and Technical Writing, 2010a

Models of Professional Writing Administration
group could agree to. The process was quite ugly and nasty, and the Director of
the Writing Program was determined to avoid such difficulties. Yet the approach
taken brought substantial anger and resentment among faculty, having a quite
negative effect on the life of the Writing Program.
5
The administrative responsibilities in the new Writing Program did bring
some course release, but unfortunately the time involved in building a collaborative
new program in a highly contentious environment at SU did not
come anywhere near compensating for the time and energy required. Many
key groups on campus attacked the premises of the Writing Program, preferring
the old Freshman English focus on grammar, on the Baker-essay fiveparagraph-theme
model, and on new-critical approaches to reading literature
as the basis for teaching writing. The Writing Program’s situation was precarious
for many years. Though the technical-writing courses were never under
attack, my administrative responsibilities involved the entire Writing Program
venture.
6
For instance, my work in cultural rhetoric gave rise to a collection entitled
Rhetoric Before and Beyond the Greeks, co-edited with Roberta Binkley, SUNY
Press, 2004.
7
Technical Communication and the World Wide Web, co-edited with Michael
Day, Erlbaum Pub., 2005.
315