As a collaborative conference between SSWCA and CUWP, we are welcoming two keynote speakers to this year’s conference

FRIDAY, MARCH 21: Dr. Tom Deans
Sponsored by the Secondary School Writing Center University Partnership (SSWCUP)

Tom Deans is Writing Center Director and Professor of English at the University of Connecticut. He’s interested in how writing works across a wide range of contexts—in school, outside of school, in social justice organizations, in the sciences—and lately he’s been thinking about the ways generative AI may reshape writing and the teaching of writing.

In 2021-22 Dr. Deans was a Fulbright Scholar in Uganda, where he worked with a university to found that nation’s first writing center. For 18 years he has partnered with the Connecticut Writing Project and schools in Connecticut to start and sustain peer writing centers that value writing across the curriculum, focus on each writer’s development, recognize the benefits of peer-to-peer tutoring, and understand writing as a complex, interactive process.

SATURDAY, MARCH 22: Dr. Anne Whitney
Sponsored by the National Writing Project (NWP)

Anne Whitney is Professor of Education at Penn State University. Her research addresses how writing fits into lives– crossing disciplinary boundaries of composition studies, professional development, teacher education, and English language arts education. This work has included studies in and out of schools, homes, and churches.

Spanning elementary, secondary, college and professional settings, her research has shared a particular focus on the relationships between writing, living, and learning toward justice and agency for all human beings. Dr. Whitney’s work has centered on preparation and professional development of teachers toward humanizing literacy education, especially in pursuit of educational equity and in school-university inquiry partnerships.