2025 - 2026 Virtual Events

 

Wed
22
2026
April 22, 2026
3:00PM - 4:30PM EDT

Balancing Administrative Roles and Responsibilities

The administrative labor of WPAs continues to increase, with more responsibilities, and sometimes multiple programs being heaped upon a single individual. This workshop offers guidance on taking stock of your labor, setting priorities, and developing strategic plans for long-term needs and goals.

  • Facilitators: Talisha Haltiwanger Morrison and Jeff Dean
  • Date and time: 4/22, 90 minutes, 3:00-4:30pm ET
  • Meeting platform: Zoom
  • Cost to members: Free for members and $25 for nonmembers

Register Here

Talisha Haltiwanger Morrison (she/her) is director of the OU Writing Center and associate professor of writing at the University of Oklahoma. From July 2020-July 2025, she also served as the director of the EKG Expository Writing Program, a small, independent first-year writing program offering special-topic courses. In these dual but distinct administrative roles, she managed programmatic concerns including curriculum development, supervising instructors, training and mentoring student tutors, and program assessment. Dr. Morrison’s research and administration interests span writing center theory, mentorship, community-based writing, and Black feminist studies.  She is co-editor of Writing Centers and Racial Justice: A Guidebook for Critical Praxis (2023), and more of her work can be found in publications such as the Writing Center Journal, the Journal of Multimodal Rhetoric and a forthcoming issue WPA: Writing Program Administration. 
 

Jeff Dean works as the Salisbury University Writing Center Coordinator. SU is a regional comprehensive university in the University System of Maryland. Jeff's main responsibilities are supervising and coordinating the non-faculty instructors of first year composition (i.e. graduate teaching assistants and adjuncts), programmatic assessment and data analysis of FYC and the writing center, developing and delivering writing center workshops, and tutoring graduate student writers. Jeff has an MA in rhetoric and composition from Salisbury University. He was previously a Maryland paramedic/firefighter for 16 years. Before graduate school, Jeff's writing background was predominantly in journalism and creative writing.

 

Fri
1
2026
May 1, 2026
2:00PM - 3:30PM EDT

Tell Your Story: Join the Mapping Program Labor Project

Due to a technical issue, this event has been rescheduled to May 1. 

What work do you do as a Chair, Lead, Coordinator, or WPA, and how does this work "count" toward your career as a whole? What does your programmatic labor include? Join this hands-up workshop to start mapping your program labor and to join a group of professionals who are interested in helping to share your story.

  • Facilitators: Joanne Baird Giordano, Stephanie Dowdle Maenhardt, Cassandra Phillips, and Erin Lehman
  • Breakout Room Facilitator: Analeigh Horton
  • Date and time: 5/1, 90 minutes, 2:00-3:30pm ET
  • Meeting platform: Zoom
  • Cost to members: Free for members

Register Here

Fri
8
2026
May 8, 2026
2:00PM - 3:15PM

Introducing the "WPA Statement on the Five Knowledge Domains of First Year Composition"

This session introduces the WPA Outcomes Statement 4.0, officially titled the "WPA Statement on the Five Knowledge Domains of First Year Composition," available now on our website. The statement no longer offers universal learning outcomes for all FYC classes. Instead, 4.0 identifies five knowledge domains central to the course (rhetorical knowledge; conventions and language; critical reading and thinking; material conditions and technologies; and composing processes), as well as three cross-category knowledge domains (accessibility and disability; generative artificial intelligence; and genre), and provides step-by-step support for programs to develop their own learning outcomes. The CWPA Executive Board unanimously approved the statement on March 4, 2026. We offer our deepest thanks to the Task Force co-chairs Antonio Byrd, Al Harahap, and Michelle Bachelor Robinson; and to the task force members Sheila Carter-Tod, Stephanie Kerschbaum, Cruz Medina, Bernice Olivas, Shelley Rodrigo, and Amy Wan.

This webinar will introduce the various innovations made to this newer version of the outcomes statement. The "WPA Statement on the Five Knowledge Domains of First Year Composition" supports contemporary writing instruction by providing a grounded approach to thinking about rhetorical knowledge, writing conventions, critical thinking, student environment and emerging technologies, as vital elements of contemporary composing processes. We hope to provide a broad overview of the document, its origins, and to invite others to begin to engage, discuss, and share the document in the various spaces and programs where student learning through writing occurs. Attendees can expect to

  • Preview the newly-approved outcomes statement
  • Engage in discussion of important concepts related to the statement, including dialogue and responses to the transition from 3.0 to 4.0.

The "WPA Statement on the Five Knowledge Domains of First Year Composition" encourages writing programs to develop locally responsive outcomes that can be aligned and adapted to a variety of institutional contexts, specifically by placing an emphasis on genre awareness and emerging questions about generative AI, and the application of an intersectional approach to contemporary composing practices.

This session will explore the theoretical foundations guiding the statement, and how writing program administrators, instructors, and campus partners can use it to support curriculum design, assessment, and increased conversations about writing instruction across disciplines.

  • Facilitators: TBA, Kelly Blewett, David Green, and Erin Lehman
  • Date and time: 5/8, 75 minutes, 2:00-3:15pm ET
  • Meeting platform: Zoom
  • Cost to members: Free for members, $25 for nonmembers

Register Here

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