Unlocking the power of words: A student's journey at the Writing Center

Former Wayne State tutor Lukis Bagdon talks with urban studies major and public history minor Alex Klaus on her experiences using the Writing Center.

Q: How did you initially hear about the Writing Center?

A: I remember hearing about it from one of my professors, who recommended it for a class project that we had. I didn’t use it until later, and I looked for the information myself. I knew my last university had a writing center and wanted to see whether Wayne State had one as well.

Q: How often do you use the Writing Center?

A: I started going to Wayne in fall 2022, so in the winter 2023 semester I began booking an appointment for at least once a week during that semester. Usually, I went in twice a week.

Q: What do you use the writing center for?

A: Mostly personal statements and essays. We also worked on a lot of scholarship essays together. This year, my main focus is a personal statement for a fellowship I’m applying to. I have a few classes that have big writing assignments, so I’ll probably go to the center for those as well. Oh! I also went last year for the final draft for my History 3000 class.

Q: I remember that! Wasn’t it a zine?

A: Yes! It ended up really good. I got an A on that project and everything. I was super, super worried.

Q: How do you feel the Writing Center has improved your writing?

A: I think in a couple ways. A big issue I had when I first started was organizing my writing. That was probably my one fatal flaw; the usual feedback I would get from people was about my organizational issues. So the Writing Center really helped me because I was going consistently and got constant feedback. I also got a lot better at brainstorming.

Another was being more concise with my writing–in scholarship essays, you have to explain really complex topics, usually about your own life, in a very short amount of words. That concision was something I typically tended to have issues with. Now that I’m writing with The South End [WSU’s student newspaper] and Outlier Media, for the South End, concision is less of an issue. But for the Outlier Media, my contracts are usually around 500 words. In those cases, I want to be very thorough and specific, which makes the word count higher. But, the Writing Center helped with strategies I can use to keep the word count down.

Q: Would you recommend others use the Writing Center?

A: Absolutely! It’s a free resource and our tuition helps fund it, why not use it? Plus, it takes a lot of the overwhelm out of brainstorming and planning something out. Having a second pair of eyes takes out the fear that there’s something such as a grammatical error or organizational issue.

The Writing Center adds another layer of value to my education that my classes don’t always offer. Some classes require you to go to the Writing Center, some don’t. If they don’t, I still recommend checking it out at least once.

I’m very used to hearing constructive criticism of my writing, but I remember as a freshman, I had never worked with editors before, so I was a little intimidated. Especially now with an asynchronous option, if you’re worried about the face-to-face interaction, there’s still no reason not to go at least once.