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Using the Composition Commons

How to Use the Composition Commons

  • Come early in the writing process, and come often.
  • Bring a copy of your assignment or writing prompt.
  • We can be most helpful if you make an appointment in advance. You can schedule a one-half-hour to one-hour appointment online.
  • You can simply stop by Room 242, Cowles Library. If a consultant is free, he or she will be happy to work with you right away.
  • If you make an appointment, please try to be on time. If you're going to miss your appointment, please let us know.

Why Use the Composition Commons?

  • to brainstorm your ideas before you choose a topic;
  • to build a paper's level of thought and to achieve more clarity through working with thesis, support, organization, and/or mechanics;
  • to draft a résumé and cover letter or to discuss scholarship-application essays;
  • to discover and develop options, flexibility and control as a writer;
  • to learn more about grammar and punctuation skills;
  • to build overall skill as a writer.

Who Uses the Composition Commons?

  • frosh through senior writers, graduate-student writers;
  • writers in any major; writers at all skill levels. Consultants from the center often make appointments with other consultants for assistance with their own writing.

Director of the Whitworth Composition Commons: Jessica Clements, Whitworth English Department, 509.777.4975 or jclements@whitworth.edu.