Category: News

January 25th–May 3rd, 2023 (Wednesdays 3:30-5:30PM)

Student Services Building 209 (See Graduate School front desk for access)

Drop in writing sessions for non-native English speakers.

For graduate students, postdocs, and visiting researchers whose first language is not English.

Show up, write, ask questions, and receive individualized feedback about your writing in a group-writing space.

Each Tuesday session starts with a short, introductory conversation after which writers work on their projects and can ask questions as needed.

Faculty Proctor: Tiffany Daigle

CSU Writes is a writing facilitation program designed for researchers and academic writers who are interested in boosting their productivity as they develop a sustainable writing practice.

A workshop designed to help writers produce an article draft in 4 hours.*

*2000-3000 word article

Open to all CSU research and scholarly writers.

We will be bold and explore what is possible, together!

To view the introductory Information Session (16-minutes) click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJ5RXdrNHyA

Drafting Session #1

February 23d, 11:30am–2:00pm, Zoom

Paced writing segments. Session includes e 30 minutes of prep and 2 hours of paced drafting time with a session leader.

Drafting Session #2

March 2nd, 11:30am–2:300pm, Zoom

This session continues with paced writing segments. The goal is for attendees to leave this session with a draft of a 2000-3000+ word manuscript.

Register here.

TUESDAY, FEB 14 at 10-10:50am on TEAMS

Have Questions about ETD?

Have your ETD questions addressed before you feel the pressures of deadlines! Attend this information session to get a jump start on formatting your thesis/dissertation.

This session covers the submission process in ProQuest, required Graduate School paperwork, the basics of copyright for theses and dissertations, as well as information on navigating CSU’s online resources.

Session Speakers

• Helen Baer, Head of Digital Repositories Unit, CSU Libraries
• Khaleedah Thomas, Scholarly Communication Librarian
• Jennifer Wang, Student Services Coordinator, Grad School

Register here.

Have you ever wondered who is behind the scenes at CSU Writes? Look no further! Meet the CSU Writes interns who make all the work here at CSU Writes possible.

• Brian Mitchell: WARP
• Emma Lynn: Communication
• Hayley Hasberger: Database
• Sarah Howard: Survey/Research

The end of fall semester draws near to be followed shortly by the holiday season. Some academic writers will put current projects on hold to turn attention to family, friends, and festivities. Some will work intermittently, and others will work intensively through break.

Unless you are in the latter group writers who plan to write regularly over break, you will benefit by taking care to pack up your writing projects by leaving detailed notes on the next steps, task, and ideas that will guide your return.

“Break” need not be a break from your devotion to your projects. You may find that a couple days of rest provides you with renewed energy to reengage with a languishing project or offers a new perspective on a previously troublesome section. Welcome the revival!

If other duties of travel or relationships will keep you from writing as regularly as you might like. Jot down a few lines of appreciation, insight, or desired next steps as time allows. These intermittent notes can both keep you connected to your project while on break as well as provide you with opportunities to make speedy progress once you resume your semester writing schedule.

May your winter break writing bring you much joy, and, if you wish, many pages, too!

Graduate students wear many hats throughout the course of their program… student (of course), teaching and research assistant, maybe instructor or part-time employee, and writer. A writer, you say? Identifying as a writer may seem unfamiliar to students, yet we aim to publish refereed journal articles, books, and other bodies of work. Aren’t we hoping to effectively share our research with the world?

Each writer has different writing habits that work for them. Try different techniques to find what works for you as you build a sustainable writing practice. Next, have a writing plan. Start with a simple outline of the project, steps in the writing process, and a reasonable timeline. You are your own project manager.

Write every day. If this isn’t possible, make a specific weekly writing schedule that works for you. Make sure to ‘show up and write’ on a regular basis. Don’t wait “until the Muse strikes” or for a looming deadline to approach. This isn’t a practical way to sustain work on a large project like a thesis or dissertation. Read good papers written by effective authors and study styles that resonate with you. Reach out to published authors in your field. They are real people, too! Build a small network of fellow writers and mentors to guide your writing efforts in grad school.

Consider joining a supportive writing community or organize your own group. Find solidarity with a small writing group formed from your research group, program cohort, or other writers. Collaborative writing sessions, whether in-person or virtual, provide a sense of accountability, build community, and maybe some free editing. To learn more, find resources at CSU Writes.

With Fall Break behind us and the end of the semester in sight, it is an appropriate time to offer gratitude to those who have helped with your writing journey and gratitude to yourself for what you have accomplished along the way.

A writing project of any kind can seem daunting, and many people choose to have an accountability buddy or group to keep them on track. Reflect on who has helped hold you accountable this semester for your writing projects and consider thanking them for their support.

Thank yourself for the incredible work you have done this semester. Whether you finished several writing projects, worked on one big writing project, have a piece in publication, or attended a symposium for your work, you have accomplished so much. The drafts and revisions you have worked tirelessly on have resulted in perfected works that you should be proud of.

Finally, thank you to you all for engaging in CSU Writes events, workshops, and retreats! If you attended any of CSU Writes events this semester from citation management to writing retreats to show up and write sessions, we value your appreciation and feedback so that we can improve our office’s offerings. We have enjoyed providing you opportunities to work on and enhance your writing endeavors and look forward to the spring semester with another great line up of events and workshops. We hope to see you then!

The 4-Hour Article Experimental Workshop Asks: Can you produce a draft manuscript in a short period of time with ease (or at least with less stress than deadline-driven binge writing?)

For most of us, we spend far less time drafting an article for publication than we spend on preparing to write or on revising and polishing what we have written.

Truly, we spend far less time with fingers to the keyboard generating a draft of article than we spend on the early stages of gathering data, analyzing and interpreting evidence, reading relevant literature, or pondering of how best to arrange thoughts on the page for readers.

The early stages of the writing process can take weeks and sometimes months or years—depending on our projects. Likewise, the iterative stage of revision and polishing a draft can take

If you’ve ever put off writing a paper to the last minute and cranked out a version under the duress of an impending deadline, you know you can produce a lot of text in a short period of time. But who like duress or the queasiness of post-binge-writing sessions? There is an easier way.

CSU Writes offers “Write at Speed” workshops most semesters to help writer generate text regularly and with greater ease so that the writer can focus more effort on the polishing and revising of their work.

This fall semester’s experimental workshop on the 4-Hour Article Draft workshop is designed to for writers to practice “writing at speed” to generate the draft of a manuscript. Participants have committed to attending two 2-hour drafting sessions through which they produce a draft of 2500-3000 word article. As with all high-quality research and scholarly writing, most of the hours the workshop writers put into their articles will happen in the preparation (pre-workshop) and revision (post-workshop) stages.

CSU Writes checks in via email to provide tips and asks for feedback about what’s working and what’s not. CSU Writes has asked participants to share their insights and experiences to continue improving the workshop over time. We are grateful to be part of such a dynamic and generous writing community. Look for future article drafting sessions in Spring 2023!

Dinaida Egan from CSU’s Research Acceleration Office will speak about the grant landscapes and resources for postdoctoral fellows. This session is also open to graduate students who may are considering postdoctoral fellowships and wish to learn more about future grant funding and writing options.

Learn more about DOC Writes here.

REGISTER HERE.