Greg Glau's WAC 101 syllabus, fall 1999

Spring 1999:

WAC 101 syllabus (based on the Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing)

ENG 101 syllabus (based on the Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing)

Fall 1998:

ENG 101 Stretch syllabus and assignments, fall 1998 (based on St. Martin's Guide to Writing, 5th ed.).

WAC 101 syllabus and assignments, fall 1998 (based the Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing).

Connect to the "piloting" page for the new text that we're piloting, the Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing.

Click here to go to Greg Glau's homepage.

For more information, see "The `Stretch Program:' Arizona State University's New Model of University-level Basic Writing Instruction" in WPA: Writing Program Administration 20 (1996):79-91. You might also want to look at information from the Conference on Basic Writing website or email me at gglau@asu.edu

Sample memo to upper administration:

To help demonstrate what we're doing with Stretch, this is a copy of a memo I sent around (in September of 1997) to everyone in upper administration who I could think of, detailing the "hard data" for the first three years of Stretch. 

In response, I (along with our Chair) received congratulatory notes from our President, Provost, Dean, and several others. After I published these data on the Writing Program Administration (WPA) Listserve, I received many inquires from schools about the program, and have served as consultant to several. A number of schools have since instituted their own Stretch programs. 

Please note that the data on the memo was submitted in the fall of 1997, while the data above includes spring 1998, so the figures don't always match. 

============================================================== ASU's Stretch Program was designed by former Directors of Composition John Ramage and Dave Schwalm, and went into full operation in the fall of 1994. We essentially "stretch" ENG 101 over two semesters--students take WAC 101 their first semester and then take ENG 101, usually with the same instructor and same group of students. This allows those students who need a little more time to move at a slightly slower pace . . . and to receive more writing experience: "regular" ENG 101 students do four papers plus a portfolio; Stretch students do six papers plus two portfolios-and each paper has intense teacher involvement and feedback and goes through multiple drafts. 

Stretch Program results so far (summarized below) are especially gratifying since we work with those students who are seen as the least prepared for college-level work: students who place into Stretch have the lowest ACT or SAT scores and are often called "at-risk" students. And while (as President Coor recently noted) about 23 percent of our current freshman class comes from under-represented groups (African American, Asian American, Hispanic, Native American), 39 percent of Stretch students come from these groups--who also are often "at-risk" in the university. 

STUDENT PERCEPTIONS
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Each semester, Stretch students complete an anonymous survey: 89 percent of our students tell us they think their "writing has improved" because of the program. Students note that especially they feel more confident about their writing (and there's a significant body of research that indicates that having confidence in writing ability is critical to writing well, no matter what the writing task). 

As we might expect, most of these students say the program "works" because of the extra time they receive to work on their writing: fully 40 percent of those students completing the survey find the extra time to be the "best thing" about the program (second-best, according to our students, is having the same teacher and the same classmates over two semesters). 

PASS RATE DATA
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Stretch students pass ENG 101 at a higher rate than "regular" ENG 101 students: 

Average pass rate, all ENG 101 students, 1994 -1998........................... 87 percent

Average pass rate, for ENG 101 Stretch students, 1994 - 98................. 92 percent

Perhaps more striking is that Stretch students also pass ENG 102 at a higher rate than "regular" ENG 101 students: 

Average pass rate, all ENG 102 students, 1991-1996..................…... 80 percent

Average pass rate, for ENG 102 Stretch students...........................… 86 percent

RETENTION DATA
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Compared to what we used to do before Stretch started (ENG 071 followed by ENG 101): 

For every 1,000 students who took ENG 071, only 280 would be here three semesters later to subsequently register for ENG 102 . . . but of every 1,000 students who take WAC 101, 460 register here for ENG 102. That is, with Stretch, 61 percent more of the students who start with WAC 101 are still here at ASU to register for ENG 102 than those who took our former ENG 071 class. 

In dollar terms: we've had 2,215 students take WAC 101 so far; if 46 percent (as above) register for ENG 102, that translates into 1,019 students. If we had not replaced ENG 071 with the Stretch model, only 620 of those 2,215 students would have taken ENG 102 here. That is, Stretch helped retain 399 students more than under the former model. You can translate better than I the dollar effect on the university of retaining 400 more students. 

In effect, ASU's Stretch Program helps the most at-risk students become the best achievers, not just in ENG 101 but even as they continue into non-Stretch classes, like ENG 102

. . . and more of them stay here at ASU.

Please feel free to email me at gglau@asu.edu for more information.