WRITING 75 - BASIC WRITING I
Benchmarks, Competencies and Portfolio Evaluation Rubric

WR 75 Benchmarks

1)         Benchmarked outcomes are numbers 1-6 below.

2)         Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 75.

3)         Benchmark levels:  70% of students will perform with at minimum outcome with a score of 75% (C) or better; 30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better; 10% percent of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4)         The measure for an outcome may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.           

WR 75 Outcomes

Outcome 1    Demonstrate control of a variety of organizational strategies at the paragraph level, such as compare and contrast, cause and effect, examples, and classification/division.

Outcome 2    Demonstrate understanding of essay structure, including the difference between introductory/concluding/transitional paragraphs and body paragraphs.

Outcome 3    Be able to maintain focus and coherence in at least one essay of about 1000 words, including using a thesis statement and transitions.

Outcome 4    Be able to distinguish among general ideas, specific evidence and analysis of evidence and to apply the distinctions to one’s own writing.

Outcome 5    Be able to produce essays containing a variety of sentence lengths and structures, including some complex sentences.

Outcome 6    Demonstrate editing skills to correct mechanical and grammatical errors in one's own work, resulting in writing  that is substantially free from both minor surface errors and major sentence errors.

Outcome 7    Demonstrate awareness of different audiences and show control of writing strategies to address those audiences.

Outcome 8    Demonstrate control of the writing process: generating ideas, organizing ideas, drafting, revising and editing.

Outcome 9    Be able to assist other writers with accurate analysis of focus, coherence, and specific development, at the essay level.

Revisions approved by Composition Committee 5/28/03

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE WR 75 PORTFOLIO RUBRIC

Revised by the Composition Committee 5-28-03
Rubric Updated 5/19/06
Course Numbers Updated 6/8/06

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WRITING 95 - BASIC WRITING II

WR 95 Benchmarks

1) Benchmarked competencies are numbers 1-8 below.

2) Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 95.

3) 70% of students will perform with at minimum competency with a score of 75% (C) or better;

30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better;

10% percent of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4) The measure for a competency may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.

Outcomes for Basic Writing II, WR 95

Outcome 1: Demonstrate control and understanding of the writing process: generating ideas, organizing ideas, drafting, revising and editing, including awareness of a variety of strategies for stages in the writing process.

Outcome 2: Demonstrate control over the basic structure of an essay, including demonstrating control over a variety of options for introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs.

Outcome 3: Maintain focus and coherence for essays of at least 1000 words, including using a thesis statement, topic sentences for body paragraphs and effective transitions within and between paragraphs.

Outcome 4: Achieve outcome 3 under time constraints, while conforming to expectations of an assigned topic and of edited English appropriate for timed writing.

Outcome 5: Demonstrate awareness of different audiences, including those of college level, and purposes and show control of writing strategies--including control of voice, tone, point of view and appropriate word choice--to address those audiences and purposes.

Outcome 6: Produce essays containing a variety of sentence lengths and structures--including some complex sentences.

Outcome 7: Edit one’s own writing for mechanical and grammatical errors, producing work that is substantially free from both minor surface errors and major sentence errors.

Outcome 8: Complete appropriate written peer reviews of student essay drafts, including suggestions for revision and editing.

Outcome 9: Use critical reading to distinguish among general ideas, specific evidence and analysis of evidence and apply the distinctions to one’s own writing, including the incorporation of at least one source as part of the writing process.

Outcome 10: Understand and avoid plagiarism, including demonstrating control of basic documentation principles in a summary or other written assignment.

REVISED 7/28/04

WRITING  121 - ENGLISH COMPOSITION
[Expository Essay Writing]

WR 121 BENCHMARKS

1) Benchmarked outcomes are numbers 1, 2 and 4 below.

2) Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 121.

3) 70% of students will perform with at minimum competency with a score of 75% (C) or better;

    30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better;

     10% percent of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4) The measure for an outcome may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.

WR 121 Competencies

Competency 1:  Write essays that use a thesis to establish control over content; supply relevant and adequate supporting details; employ the organizational strategies of effective beginnings, transitions, and endings; and conform to standard edited English.

Competency 2:  Achieve Competency 1 under time constraints (prior to the final exam), while conforming to expectations of an assigned topic and of edited English appropriate for timed writing.

Competency 3:  Demonstrate the ability to use a variety of expository essay patterns, such as definition, classification, analysis, problem-solution, and comparison-contrast.

Competency 4:  Employ one or more sources responsibly (without plagiarizing) in a summary or another writing assignment.

Competency 5:  Demonstrate, in an essay, a sustained style employing rhetorically effective tone, persona, diction, idiom, and syntax.

Competency 6:  Use critical reading and writing to analyze and synthesize ideas in an academic writing sample, identifying rhetorical patterns, major assertions, and supporting details.

Competency 7:  Complete appropriate written critical peer reviews of student essay drafts, including suggestions for revision and editing.

Competency 8:  Complete at least one (formal or informal) written review of the student's own writing strengths and weaknesses, including effective self-prescriptions for improvement.

Competency 9:  Demonstrate, monitor, and articulate the complete idiosyncratic process that the individual writer uses to complete an essay, including such steps as invention, thesis formation, organization, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading.

Competency 10:  Demonstrate an awareness of a variety of purposes and audiences.

Revisions approved by Composition Committee 1/28/02
See also Writing Course Placement, Prerequisites, & Policies 
URL:  http://web.cocc.edu/humanities/courses/writing/policies.htm

WR 122 BENCHMARKS

1) Benchmarked outcomes are numbers 1-4 below.

2) Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 122.

3) 70% of students will perform with at minimum competency with a score of 75% (C) or better;

30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better;

10% percent of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4) The measure for an outcome may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.

WR 122 Competencies

Competency 1: Demonstrate the ability to use a variety of analytical and argumentative essay patterns (such as evaluation of a published argument, comparative analysis of sources, persuasion, argumentation synthesis).

Competency 2: Demonstrate the ability to use several quotations from either published sources or interviews, which are (1) integrated into the student’s own writing (at both the paragraph and the sentence level), and (2) correctly documented according to some currently accepted practice.

Competency 3: Demonstrate the ability to adopt a persona or tone that serves one’s persuasive purposes in written argument, and to identify and anticipate audience considerations (e.g. readers’ knowledge, assumptions, beliefs/values, attitudes, needs) in the selection of evidence and presentation of the writer’s argument.

Competency 4: Summarize published arguments and analyze components of written arguments, such as claim, support (including the distinction between observation and inference, fact and opinion), warrants, assumptions, logic, rebuttals, credibility, psychological appeals, connotation, tone, slanted language, irony).

Competency 5: Use writing to provide a peer with alternative viewpoints and suggestions for revising and editing.

Competency 6: Adopt a writing process to incorporate the special concerns of arguments such as analyzing opposing viewpoints, synthesizing personal opinions with written sources, thesis formation, organization, drafting, revising, editing and proofreading.

Competency 7: Analyze and evaluate one’s own argument, identifying strengths, weaknesses and potential biases, assumptions--and suggest some means of improving his or her argumentative practice.

WRITING  123 - ENGLISH COMPOSITION
[Research-based Writing]

WR 123 BENCHMARKS

1) Benchmarked outcomes are numbers 1-6 below.

2) Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 123.

3) 70% of students will perform with at minimum competency with a score of 75% (C) or better;

30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better;

10% percent of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4) The measure for an outcome may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.

WR 123 Competencies

Competency 1:  Create a search strategy that proposes a manageable research topic based on exploratory thinking and investigation; that establishes a clear direction and focus for the project; that employs a variety of resources available through the library (such as books, periodicals, government documents, cd-rom databases, and infotrac), through inter-library loan, through the internet, and/or through student-directed empirical research (such as surveys, interviews, and questionnaires); and that results in a thesis that the student develops and tests through the course of the research process.

Competency 2:  Demonstrate proficiency at critically reading, analyzing and evaluating both primary and secondary sources in order to interpret and responsibly manage facts, statistics, inferences, expert opinions, lay opinions, value judgments, and empirical data.

Competency 3:  Develop a research system that avoids plagiarism and fairly represents sources by quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing with appropriate documentation.

Competency 4:  Demonstrate proficiency in such integral research writing tasks as the summary, abstract, proposal, annotated bibliography, critical review of literature, and formal outline.

Competency  5:  Revise and edit the research paper to meet college-level writing standards and to satisfy the student's rhetorical purpose and audience.

Competency  6:  Develop awareness of differing citation and bibliographic systems from various academic disciplines and develop competence in one system most appropriate for a specific research-based academic paper.

Competency 7:  Plan and manage the process of writing to incorporate the special concerns of research writing: converting notes, summaries and quotations into a text unified and organized by effective transitions and restatement; negotiating among the divergent voices of the sources while clearly conveying the student's own persona and tone; integrating a variety of documentary sources with the student's own thinking; effectively employing the recursive stages of drafting, revising, and editing; and maintaining a consistent work schedule that ensures the final draft is delivered on time.

Competency 8:  Use writing to provide peers with alternative viewpoints and suggestions for revising and editing research writing.

Competency 9:  Analyze and evaluate one's own research writing, identifying strengths and weaknesses in the research process and product--and suggest some means of improving his or her practice of gathering, synthesizing, organizing, and presenting information.

WRITING 121 - T - Technical English Composition

WR 121-T COMPETENCIES - or Learning OUTCOMES

Outcome 1  Write essays and/or reports that use a thesis to establish control over content; supply relevant and adequate supporting details drawn from personal experience, observation, and/or responsive reading; employ the organizational strategies of effective headings, beginnings, transitions, and endings; and conform to standard edited English.

Outcome 2  Achieve outcome 1 under time constraints (prior to the final exam), while conforming to expectations of an assigned topic and of edited English appropriate for timed writing.

Outcome 3  Demonstrate the ability to use a variety of expository essay and report patterns, such as technical process, definition, classification, problem-solution, and evaluation.

Outcome 4  Employ one or more source(s) responsibly (without plagiarizing) in a summary or other writing assignment.

Outcome 5  Demonstrate, in an essay or report, a sustained style employing rhetorically effective tone, persona, diction, idiom, and syntax.

Outcome 6  Use critical reading and writing to analyze,  synthesize, and evaluate ideas in an academic writing sample, identifying rhetorical patterns, major assertions, and supporting details. 

Outcome 7  Complete appropriate written critical peer reviews of student assignment drafts, including suggestions for revision and editing.

Outcome 8 Complete at least one (formal or informal) written review of the student's own writing strengths and weaknesses, including effective self-prescriptions for improvement.

Outcome 9 Demonstrate, monitor, and articulate the complete idiosyncratic process that the individual writer uses to complete an essay or report, including such steps as invention, thesis formation, organization, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading

Outcome 10  Demonstrate an awareness of a variety of purposes and levels of audience.

WR 121-T BENCHMARKS

1. Benchmarked outcomes are numbers 1, 2 and 4 above
2. Benchmarks are program-wide, as well as specific to each section of WR 121T
3. 70% of students will perform at minimum competency with a score of 75% © or better;

   30% of students will perform at advanced skill level with a score of 85% (B) or better;
   10% of students will perform at mastery skill level with a score of 95% (A) or better.

4. The measure for an outcome may be a single assignment or more than one assignment in each class.
   

Outcome 6      Integrate document design and computer formatting strategies (such as headings, white space, vertical listings, enumeration or bulleting, font changes, and parallel structures) to improve accessibility of information.

Outcome 8      Develop a careful system of note-taking, drafting, and incorporating research data into a coherent report that avoids plagiarism and fairly represents sources by paraphrasing, quoting, and summarizing with appropriate documentation from the business discipline.

Outcome 10    Demonstrate interpersonal skills to function successfully in the group writing process, including group interaction and leadership, scheduling, and prioritizing group resources.

Approved by Composition Committee January 25, 2006

Outcome 1:   Acquire an introductory understanding of the conventions of dramatic writing, including understanding those conventions that distinguish writing for the stage from writing for film/video.

Writing Course Outcomes (formerly known as: Competencies)
URL of this webpage: http://web.cocc.edu/humanities/courses/writing/competencies.htm
Last updated: 29 September 2006
Maintained by Cora Agatucci and Kathy Williams