The Writing Centre

How to Book an Appointment

Click the button above to be taken to the Writing Centre booking page. It may ask you to log in using your FDU student account. Once you are there, you will see booking options based on the tutor’s remaining availability. You may sign up for up to two hours per week.

Responsibilities

The writing tutor will help you to identify how your writing can be revised and improved. However, the writing tutor’s role is not to proofread or edit your work. Instead, the tutor will help you to revise your writing by discussing the assignment with you, identifying issues in your writing, offering strategies that you can apply, and providing resources for improving language functions and rules.

Appointments

When you book an appointment, you are entering into an informal contract in which you commit to meeting with the tutor at the specified time.

If you cannot attend the appointment, you must provide at least 12 hours’ notice, either in person or by email, so that the appointment slot can be made available to another student.

1. Book an appointment for  30 minutes or 45 minutes. This allows the tutor enough time to provide appointment opportunities to all students wanting to visit the Writing Centre.
2. Book an appointment only if you are sure that you are able to attend the appointment on time. Punctuality is required. 
3. Book one appointment per day.
4. You may book up to 2 hours of appointments in  each week unless special arrangements have been made directly through your professor or with the tutor. 
5. Book all appointments using the Bookings page (also linked above).
6. When you book your appointment, you will be asked to provide a copy of the assignment and/or the draft you are working on by email. Please send it promptly so that the tutor can provide you with the best support.
7. When you come to the appointment, bring either a printout of your draft or a copy of your draft on a laptop. No phones or tablets.
8. The tutor  will review one assignment per appointment. Make a new appointment if you want to review another. 
9. For group projects, all members must attend and bring their parts separately.

Tutoring sessions are designed to help you develop as a writer. Arriving on time and being prepared to discuss your needs will help us to better support you. Doing your own editing and necessary practice will help you build your skills.

Academic Referrals

A student may be referred by an instructor or program director because of a specific academic difficulty: for example, struggling with course content or academic language requirements, achieving poor grades, or dealing with academic probation.

Tutors help students learn and implement strategies to improve their academic development and achieve success in their program of study. Students who participate in the program are more likely to raise their GPAs and be released from academic probation than students who try to manage on their own.

Purpose

The Writing Centre’s mission is to help graduate and undergraduate students become stronger academic writers. We provide free assistance to help you revise your papers, presentations, projects, reports, resumes, emails, and other academic writing tasks.

Our goal is to help you to learn how to become more effective and more confident in your writing tasks. Regardless of your current writing skills, you can benefit from sharing your work with knowledgeable and skilled critical readers.

In a 30-minute one-on-one meeting, we can help you to:

• Understand the professor’s expectations for a writing assignment
• Generate ideas
• Find and organize your research
• Develop logical arguments
• Develop strategies for self and peer revising
• Identify recurring errors and locate resources to help you correct them
• Use proper citation for your research resources

Writing Centre Handouts

How to Register for a Workshop

Click the link below to sign up for an Academic Workshop:

Academic Workshops Online Sign Up

Academic Enhancement Workshop List

Workshops (the date and time will vary each semester) with description are listed below.

Vancouver Academic Writing Centre

Orion Kidder, PhD, Coordinator of Vancouver Academic Writing Centre

Aden DurEAden, Writing Centre Tutor