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COCC WIC PROGRAM

Central Oregon Community College offers courses in a variety of subject areas designated as "WIC," or Writing in Context of many disciplines. These courses teach the subject matter of the course title using a significant component of formal and informal writing.  Students who successfully complete a COCC lower-division WIC course demonstrate the ability to use writing to learn course content, and to apply foundational writing skills to writing tasks typical of a particular academic discipline or professional-technical field. 

In the 1980s, a pedagogical movement commonly known as Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) developed in response to nation-wide concerns about "a perceived deficiency in literacy among college students" (CITE OWL PURDUE: Writing Across the Curriculum and Writing Across the Disciplines).  While students completing programs and/or degrees from accredited U.S. colleges and universities were required to demonstrate at least minimum writing proficiency by successfully passing tests and/or completing one (or more) foundational Writing courses, WAC proponents recognized that:

• writing is one of those skills that you lose if you do not use it: in other words, even students who had received competent instruction and demonstrated strong proficiency in required/prerequisite Writing courses at an early stages in their education, found their writing skills degenerating when not adequately reinforced, developed and exercised in subsequent college coursework;

• students who "passed" required college Writing courses--even those who earned A's or B's--needed specific guidance in transferring and adapting their foundational skills to new writing tasks required by courses in specific academic disciplines and professional fields;

• the powerful potential of using writing to learn the content of courses across the curriculum, in many disciplines and professions, was not being adequately employed.

COCC's WIC Course Program was inaugurated in 1995, an outgrowth of more informal Writing Across Disciplines (WAD) workshops among interdisciplinary COCC faculty who believed that writing is an essential communication skill and powerful learning tool that our students must develop in order to achieve their academic and professional, as well as civic and personal life goals. 
 

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WIC Links: Online Resources for Writing Across Disciplines
Humanities Instructional Resources