Courses

Courses for Spring 2026

Complete Cornell University course descriptions and section times are in the Class Roster.

Courses by semester

Course ID Title
WRIT 1038 Tutorial in Academic Writing

This writing tutorial is designed for students who need more directed practice in navigating the academic writing process. The course emphasizes the analytic and argumentative writing and critical reading essential for university-level work.

Full details for WRIT 1038 - Tutorial in Academic Writing

WRIT 1380 FWS: Elements of Academic Writing

Join this course to study the essential elements of academic writing and to learn flexible and sustainable strategies for producing interesting, clear, and precise academic prose that can address a variety of audiences and meet diverse rhetorical aims. WRIT 1370/WRIT 1380 is a smaller FWS (capped at 12 students) that spends more time navigating the steps in the writing process in order to respond to each student’s individual needs and build confidence and reflective practice. As in all FWSs, students practice higher-order thinking, close reading, and analyzing evidence. They also complete 4-5 major writing assignments. This course places greater emphasis on in-class writing, one-on-one conferences with the teacher, peer workshopping, discussion, and learning to talk about how different types of writing work. Students will deeply engage diverse course materials (journalism, scholarly articles, podcasts, films, etc.) on topics like art, literature, and relevant social issues to explore ideas about a text, write for specific audiences, and develop creativity, style, and voice.

Full details for WRIT 1380 - FWS: Elements of Academic Writing

WRIT 1390 Special Topics in Writing

This course provides the opportunity for students to resolve significant writing challenges that have interfered with their academic progress. Students must have ongoing writing projects on which to work. Instruction is in weekly tutorials. Interested students should go to 174 Rockefeller for more information.

Full details for WRIT 1390 - Special Topics in Writing

WRIT 1968 FWS: Public Writing

We now live in a 24-hour news cycle that bombards college students with news every day--in multiple forms such as news apps, social media, and online news sources. Who has time to read all these articles and which news can we trust? How do we ever find news that isn't biased? This first-year seminar offers students an opportunity to read the news on topics they wish to read about and learn more about how to find reputable articles and discern when they aren't. As we analyze how journalists write to big, broad audiences, students will write to different members of the public about contemporary controversies in the news-in the form of investigative essays, blog posts, and short news digests.

Full details for WRIT 1968 - FWS: Public Writing

WRIT 2101 Responding to Writing: Theory and Pedagogy

Although many of us have experiences being taught to write, helping someone else improve their writing in ways that respect their agency and cultivate learning is often not intuitive. In order to learn about ethical and educational methods of tutoring, this course introduces scholarship on tutoring, writing centers, and writing pedagogy. We will be critically thinking about your own writing process and experiences, responding to another’s writing, and reading about collaborative learning strategies, multilingual writing challenges, ethical considerations in peer tutoring, and the ways in which race and other facets of identity affect tutoring and learning. With an emphasis on the connection between theory and practice, you will get tutored, observe and reflect on tutoring sessions, practice reading and responding to sample student writing, and develop your own tutoring pedagogy—a theory of tutoring that considers the relationship between tutoring practices and the values those practices imply. The aim of the course is to cultivate knowledge and flexibility in the use of tutoring strategies for supporting agency and growth in diverse writers working on a variety of genres from across the disciplines.

Full details for WRIT 2101 - Responding to Writing: Theory and Pedagogy

WRIT 7101 Writing in the Majors Seminar

Teaching assistants assigned to Writing in the Majors projects enroll in a six-week course on teaching strategies in advanced instruction.

Full details for WRIT 7101 - Writing in the Majors Seminar

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