National Day on Writing
Write My Community: Celebrate the National Day on Writing!
The National Day on Writing is an annual event sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English and recognized by the United States Congress. The day celebrates the importance of writing in our lives. Excelsior College celebrates the National Day on Writing with two events: a webinar entitled “What We Tell Ourselves about Writing: Cultural Stories of Writing and Their Effects” featuring Doug Downs from Montana State University and an essay contest for Excelsior College students.
Essay Contest
Using the theme “Write My Community,” all Excelsior College students are invited to participate in an essay contest about the importance writing plays in our lives personally and/or professionally. What role does writing play in your personal, professional, and/or local communities? Why is writing so important?
To enter the contest, write an essay of 800 to 1000 words on any aspect of this question.
Contest Rules:
1. The essays will be judged by a committee of writing experts from Excelsior College.
2. Essays must be typed, double-spaced, and should meet the theme and length requirements.
3. 
​Name, standing at the college, e-mail, and a phone number should be included on a cover page only. The title of the essay and essay should be on the following page without contact information.
4. The committee will evaluate essays on the following criteria:
- Originality
- Development
- Organization
- Focus
- Clarity
- Style
5. The top four essays will receive an Excelsior College t-shirt, and the top two essays will be published in Excelsior Life with the potential for publication in Excelsior College’s official magazine, Excelsior. The winners will be announced during the Excelsior College National Day on Writing Webinar to be held October 20, 2014.
6. Submissions in the form of a .doc, .docx, or .pdf file should be sent to owl@excelsior.edu by Friday, October 10, 2014 at 5:00 PM EST. In the subject line, write “Essay Contest.” In the body of the e-mail, you must write a sentence stating that the essay you are submitting is your original work. Your submission should be included as an attachment.
Webinar
On Monday, October 20, from 6:30 to 7:30 PM EST, please join Excelsior College in an event to celebrate the National Day on Writing. Sponsored by the Excelsior College OWL, the event will feature a guest speaker, Doug Downs, Associate Professor of Writing Studies and Director of Composition at Montana State University.
Dr. Downs’ presentation, entitled “What We Tell Ourselves about Writing: Cultural Stories of Writing and Their Effects” will focus on the stories we tell about writing and the lessons we can learn from them. American cultures are replete with images, stories, and truisms about writers and writing. The story of the “grammar nazi” teacher and the students who cower beneath her bleeding-red pen. The story of the college educated student who is still a failure in writing clear, concise workplace communication. The story of the talented and inspired genius novel writer for whom writing comes easy. The story of the student who can’t write because he’s been corrupted by texting. The story of writing as mastery of language-drive print texts now being overwhelmed by an easier, lazier visual culture. But how much do these stories reflect the actual experiences of mature, professional writers in a variety of cultural writing scenes—the marketing copy-writer, the engineering designer, the office worker, the journalist, the public advocacy specialist, the civic activist? And how many of the underlying metaphors and conceptions of writing shared by our cultural stories of writing are accurate and actually reflective of what research shows us about how writing and writers work? In this talk, Doug Downs will re-tell some of these stories in order to un-tell them: to question their premises and what they cost us, both culturally and as individual writers and learners-of-writing.
After Dr. Downs’ presentation, Dr. Joe Bocchi, Writing Program Director at Excelsior College will briefly share his work at Excelsior College to bring a new story of writing to the writing program and the college. He will share plans for a new inter-disciplinary writing degree at Excelsior College.
The evening will conclude with a brief presentation by Dr. Crystal Sands, Director of the Online Writing Lab, of the winners of the Excelsior College National Day on Writing essay contest with time for questions for our guest, Dr. Downs.