Needham Resident Named College Writing Coach

Edward Van Sickle, son of Barbara and Edward Van Sickle of Needham, has been named a writing coach at Saint Michael's College for the fall 2012 semester.

Van Sickle, a junior business administration major, was selected from nominees submitted by the college faculty to be one of 27 student coaches at the liberal arts college located in Burlington, VT. Van Sickle graduated from Needham High School before entering Saint Michael's.

The coaches are an elite group who do professional work-one-on-one with their peers at the college, diagnosing writing problems, designing strategies to help. The coaches work with clients who seek guidance regarding writing assignments for their courses. They follow the premise, "Teach the writer, not the writing," and thereby don't just correct a given paper, but work with writers, so that they will have skills to improve their writing on their own in future assignments.

The carefully selected coaches have to pass an entry test to get into a Writing Center Internship course which they take prior to being named coaches. They are also given special instructions for working with students with learning differences and working with non-native speakers of English. International students comprise a substantial portion of the visitors to the writing center. Coaches are selected because of their language skills, patience, flexibility, good humor, and a good knowledge of written English.

The Writing Center is directed by Timothy Mackin, who has a Ph.D. in English, from Johns Hopkins University, with specialization in American and British modernism. He is former Associate Editor of English Literary History and served as Director of the Johns Hopkins University Writing Center.