TAMUQ opens writing, language lab
Texas A&M University at Qatar opened its long-awaited Technical Communications Center this fall, a major step in efforts to enhance oral and written communication skills among engineering students at the Middle East campus.
The Technical Communications Center (TCC) is much like the University Writing Center in that it offers one-on-one help to students who are working on writing projects. But the center takes on a larger role as a language lab for students in Qatar, for most of whom English is a non-native language. Bolstered by staff trained as ESL specialists and by innovative software such as ClarityEnglish, the TCC serves as an academic hub that provides resources for every communications component of the curriculum, be it writing, speaking or basic English skills.
Cecilia Hawkins
“The greatest challenge for all of us is to equip the TAMUQ students with the language tools they need to succeed as engineering students in an all-English curriculum,” Hawkins said, “and then to succeed as professional engineers where writing and oral communication will be critical.”
The center is directed by Cecelia Hawkins, senior lecturer in the
Department of English and a 30-year veteran of teaching writing.
Hawkins left her post as writing consultant at the George Bush School
of Government & Public Service earlier this year and has been
working since then to open the TCC.
“My philosophy is
informed by my observation of and experience with the UWC as it has
grown and changed over the years since its beginning as a small room
with a few computers and a few grad students in the English
department,” Hawkins said. “We have much the same philosophy here: a
desire to create a welcoming and low-risk environment where students
can come to improve their writing.”
And they are
coming
