English dept. cracks down on poor

Sitting in front of his classroom, legs crossed, Timothy Barnard - a part-

time instructor in the history department - reminisced about a former student of his who wrote a paper using text-message slang.

Apparently, Barnard isn't the only teacher who has cursed the poor diction of some students.

Several professors have asked the English department to place more emphasis on grammar, said Brad McAdon, an associate professor in the English department and the director of the composition program.

"Faculty members and administrators campus-wide have expressed a need for improving both student writing and the teaching of writing," McAdon said. "We are responding to this expressed need."

In response to professors' urging, the department recently approved a new set of course goals for English 1010 and 1020, which emphasize building foundational communication skills.

Vice Provost Thomas Nenon said the problem wasn't confined to The U of M - even Ivy League schools are troubled by their students' grammatical skills. The reason grammar should matter to students, he said, is because in an increasingly competitive job market, better communication skills translate into more job opportunities.

"Employers tell us over and over that written and oral communication skills are crucial in deciding whom they hire and whom they promote," Nenon said. "We really do think that if we catch [bad grammar] at an early age and help [students] improve their skills, we believe that this will not only increase their academic success but also their career success."

McAdon spent part of his summer researching new technological advancements in online grammatical tutoring, along with six other instructors. Working with the Advanced Learning Center, the group investigated online English programs, grammatical diagnostic tests and how these tests could help students learn. The group's research, which is in the initial stages, hasn't come to any conclusion yet.

The new grammar policy is for the students' benefit, McAdon stressed. The two goals of the policy, he said, are to improve students' writing and the teaching of writing. According to McAdon, these two goals are "essential" to students' success "in their educational years and beyond."

"We do not view our approach as 'cracking down on grammar,'" he said, "but providing students with resources and instruction that, we think, can improve their writing. Teaching grammar is only a part of improving writing, but many of us think that it can be an important part."

Katherine Lubiani, a sophomore majoring in psychology lamented some students' impoverished knowledge of basic literary devices.

"I think they should learn English in high school," she said. "People don't even know what first, second and third person are."

Mechanical engineering freshman Andrew Walkley said a lack of grammatical sense is not the fault of teachers, but of students.

"A lot of it is, students don't really care in class," Walkley said. "That, or they don't study."