Counterstory in the Center: Replacing Privileged Pedagogy with Brave Teaching of Writing from Praxis: A Writing Center Journal Vol.19 No.1

When students walk into a writing center—online or onsite—they reverse the dynamics and politics of traditional pedagogy. Drafts in hand, whether confident or confused about their writing tasks, the second they set foot in writing center space, students seize agency for their success as writers. That matters tremendously because it disrupts the story of how writing instruction should happen. As writing center workers, we know a big unspoken truth that forms a conundrum of institutional life: that the instructors who are nominally responsible for teaching writing, whether in English classes or other disciplines, often ignore, renege on, or simply reject the responsibility of teaching writing. In other words, the story of teaching writing in institutional settings often turns into a counterstory where the writing center becomes the site of instruction not just a site of support. ; University Writing Center