Center for Writing Serves All Students
Center for Writing Serves All Students: Wide range of services includes tailored assistance for students who speak Icelandic as a second language
Photos / Kristinn Ingvarsson
The University of Iceland Center for Writing
The University of Iceland Center for Writing was born in January 2020 when writing centers from the School of Education and School of Humanities merged. As the center for the entire school, it assists all students and staff with anything writing-related at the university. The center offers a variety of services: workshops, writing groups, in-class instruction, a website with information about academic writing and citations, and peer tutoring. Peer tutoring is the core of the center’s operations. Students can book an appointment with a peer tutor to receive assistance with everything from structure to argumentation to language use to citations.
Assistance for students writing in Icelandic as a second language
Photos / Kristinn Ingvarsson
In 2017, the School of Education Writing Center surveyed students at the University of Iceland who do not count Icelandic as their native language. From that survey, it became clear how diverse this group of students is. For example, survey respondents had lived in Iceland between two and 30 years, with an average of 10 years residing in Iceland. Some of them had entered the Icelandic school system in elementary school and others first at the University of Iceland. In the end, 88% of the students who answered the survey said they needed more support in writing academic Icelandic.
At around the same time, other research happening in Iceland showed that students who reported not having Icelandic as their native language often face difficulties in their studies, among them language issues, a lack of information flow, and a lack of communication (Artëm Ingmar Benediktsson, Anna Katarzyna Wozniczka, Kriselle Lou Suson Jónsdóttir & Hanna Ragnarsdóttir, 2018). From this and the earlier survey, it was clear that the need was an opportunity for the Center for Writing to better support University of Iceland students who are writing in Icelandic but do not consider Icelandic to be their native language.
In response, the School of Education Writing Center started to offer specific tutoring sessions for these students to support them in writing all types of academic work in Icelandic, from course essays to final theses. In spring 2019, the project was awarded a grant from the Immigrant Development Fund to take the original initiative even further. With the grant, the center hopes to help even the field for all students at the University of Iceland, at least when it comes to academic writing.
Photos / Kristinn Ingvarsson
Support group
The support group for students with other native languages started in the fall of 2019 in response to many students reporting feeling alone in their difficulties in writing academic Icelandic. Modeled after other writing groups facilitated by the center, the concept was to give students a chance to come together to write and ask questions of each other and the center tutor facilitating the group. Students who have attended the group sessions have used them to ask for help understanding assignments, get support on spelling and grammar, share their experiences of academic writing in Icelandic, and learn more about resources to help them in their writing, among other things.
Myndir / Kristinn Ingvarsson
Unsurprisingly, Covid-19 impacted the support group, and in-person meetings were cancelled for some time. The group, though, continued to exist on Facebook under the title Ritunaraðstoð fyrir erlenda nemendur HÍ, where students can ask questions of each other and the center staff who moderate the group. Of course, that is not as dynamic as in-person meetings, so the center will be restarting those this semester. They will take place every other Wednesday from 10:00 – 12:00 and will be announced on Ugla. For the foreseeable future, the group will meet online in Teams.
The peer tutoring sessions mentioned earlier are always available for booking at the center’s website, ritver.hi.is. For students who do not consider Icelandic to be their native language, the center invites you to book your sessions under Aðstoð við verkefni á íslensku to let your peer tutor best prepare for your time together.
We at the Center for Writing strongly encourage all students to join our groups, take part in our workshops, and book appointments with us.