Required Services Statement

We greatly appreciate the support of faculty across campus in promoting the Writing Center to their students. We are here to help and support you. However, we have limited resources; unfortunately, we cannot support required use of our services. We also request that you do not incentivize your students to use our services (e.g., in the form of students earning points or extra credit for receiving tutoring services.) Our reasoning for this policy is outlined below. 

• Demand for our services exceeds the supply of appointments. We have a team of about 30-35 employees serving a campus of 30,000+ students. In practical terms, we cannot accommodate required use of our tutoring. 
• When students make appointments because they are required to come, they prevent students who voluntarily seek help from getting it. 
• Writing Center services complement and supplement the writing instruction that takes place within courses. We do not have the staff to support individual writing instruction for all students in any single course. Our services cannot replace the writing instruction necessary in any particular course.
• Students who aren't invested often don't learn as well. Past experience has taught us that students who are required to visit the Writing Center are not always interested in improving their writing skills. Some--certainly not all--visit us with the expectation that they will stay for just a few minutes so that we will write an e-mail attesting to their appearance here.

While we request that professors do not require students to use our services, we ask that professors instead encourage their students to visit the Writing Center. Professors can also bring students to the Writing Center for a tour of our space if they'd like to introduce them to our services. 

We greatly appreciate your cooperation in this matter. If you have any questions, feel free to contact us. Also feel free to reach out to our Director, Michelle Hager (michelle.hager@sjsu.edu), if you'd like to discuss requiring or incentivizing Writing Center visits for your students.