| Academic writing centres, like the Academic Writing Centre (AWC), depend on a pre-service training program to prepare new tutors to teach academic writing alongside other more experienced tutors. This ethnographic study explores the effectiveness of the current pre-service training program employed by the AWC. Drawing on Engeström's (1987) cultural-historical activity theory, Schön's (1983) "reflective practitioner" theory, Lave and Wenger's (1991) "situated learning" theory, and rhetorical genre theory to build an analytical framework, this study considers how the AWC's cultural-historical context influences its practices, how senior tutors define current pre-service training practices, and how junior tutors are socialized into the AWC. Over a six-month period, three kinds of data were collected and analyzed recursively (Charmaz, 2006): interviews with five tutors and three coordinators (present and former), observations recorded in detailed field notes, and various documents from the AWC. Findings from the study suggest that the training provided to junior tutors, shaped by a complex web of inside and outside influences, is effective in preparing the tutors to work with student writers. |
