Help for Graduate Students
If you’ve been told that you’re not a strong writer, you’re not alone. Education has declined in many places in the last few decades, and it is possible to receive a high school or even a college degree without learning how to write. Many students arrive at college or graduate school believing that they know how to write well, and are surprised that their instructors do not agree.
Some years ago, the APA Monitor, the official monthly publication of the American Psychological Association, published a long article about remedial programs in many colleges nationwide (Murray, 1997). Grade inflation, insufficient academic requirements in high school, and a wide variation in the quality of high school teaching were named as possible causes of the academic problems that many students face in college.
A. Bartlett Giamatti, president of Yale University , lamented that many Yale students “cannot handle English — cannot make a sentence or paragraph, cannot organize a paper, cannot follow through — well enough to do college work” (quoted in Paul, 1996, p. 28). If some Yalies can’t write, is it surprising that others are struggling?
Unfortunately, the problem is not always solved at the undergraduate level. Some colleges confer degrees on students whom they did not teach to write. If you are among these, it is not entirely your fault. However, it is your responsibility to improve your writing, making it correct, clear, and coherent, if you really want to succeed as a writer.