Duke University Writing Program
From Duke Wiki
The Duke University Writing Program provides a unique experience to first-year students in the Trinity College of Arts and Sciences. Every freshman is required to enroll in one section of Writing 20: Academic Writing, a writing-intensive course designed to prepare students for writing in a collegiate and professional setting. Unlike typical writing courses, however, which focus greatly on mechanics, plagarism, and writing style, the writing courses at Duke University also focus on the development of ideas, synthesis of new ideas, working with other researchers, and behaving in an academic community. This is facilitated by a vast range of focused topics, each a twelve-student section in the course. Topics have ranged from; the politics of scientific discovery, rewriting the past, the problem of textbooks, coral reefs, postcards, utopia, and countless others, spanning all disciplines. Fifteen to twenty different topics are typically offered per semester. The small class sizes encourage fruitful discussion and considerable peer work, fostering the attitude of the academic world, in which members work together, yet are competing at the same time.
