Which AWR course is right for me?

ATWP 135 has been designed to support students working towards degrees in all academic programs across the university. (This is not a literature course.) ATWP 135 will build on your high school writing, reading, and research experiences to help you learn and practice skills needed to thrive in upper-level courses. You will read texts by researchers from a range of academic disciplines working within the conventions of different scholarly fields. You will also produce various types of academic writing, including a research paper, in preparation for future projects in your major field of study. Sample ATWP 135 syllabus

ATWP 135 will be of particular interest to students

• Who are ready to undertake university-level reading and writing;
• Who want to develop strong reading, writing, and research skills suitable for any program of study;
• And who are interested in analyzing academic language and arguments produced for a range of different audiences.

This section (A13) will be held on Mondays and Thursdays from 1:00 – 2:20 in the First Peoples House. This course will follow the standard curriculum of the ATWP 135 course, but adds presentations from Indigenous resources on campus and provides an opportunity to get to know other Indigenous students and the First Peoples House. This course was highly successful last year, with students reporting that they enjoyed the sense of connection with other students, the smaller class size, and the experience of learning in the First Peoples House.

ATWP 135 will build on your previous writing, reading, and research experiences to help you learn and practice skills that you will need to thrive in upper-level university courses. You will read texts by researchers from a range of academic disciplines working within the conventions of different scholarly fields. You will also produce various types of academic writing in preparation for future projects in your major field of study.

As students experiment with written expression and other forms of communication in ways that value traditional learning and the well-being of individuals, families, and communities while effectively sharing ideas with a range of audiences, they can expect support from not only the course instructor but also from Elders, tutors, advisors, and each other.

This small class (capped at a maximum of 30 students, but typically smaller, last year was 14) will meet in a classroom in First Peoples House and seeks to provide students with a safe and welcoming space in which to learn how to participate in and transform academic conversations linked to university research.

ATWP 110 creates a distinct, supportive learning community that interconnects the learning outcomes of two academic writing courses (ATWP 101 and ATWP 135). In the fall term, students will begin with shorter, simpler readings and tasks; essentially, the fall focus is on sentence-level writing and paragraph-length assignments. Having built up their skills, in the second term students will be confident about undertaking the more difficult and multifaceted tasks an AWR course asks of them.

This student-centred learning opportunity is designed to meet the needs of students who have one or more than one of the following characteristics:

• Anyone who enters UVic unsure about their academic writing skills;
• Anyone whose high school marks in grade 11 or 12 English courses were 75 or lower;
• Anyone who is the first member of their family to pursue a university degree;
• Indigenous students;
• International students whose first language is not English;
• Mature students who have been out of the education system for some time.

English 101 is for students interested in learning how to research and write at the university level through the study of literature. Readings may include fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction (think Cheryl Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves, Art Spiegelman's graphic novel, Maus, and short stories by Sto:lo author Lee Maracle). In this class, you will develop your academic writing skills while making research-based arguments about literacy texts. English 101 is suitable for any discipline.

This course will appeal to students if

• You are interested in thinking about what literature can tell us about the world;
• You want a chance to read some exciting fiction, poetry, and drama from our time;
• You want to sharpen your writing and speaking skills while discussing great works of literature;
• And/or you're considering an English major or minor.

English 102 is for students interested in learning how to research and write and the university level through the study of literature. If you are passionate about literature (think capital "L" Literature), this course if for you! This class devotes its time to a single text or set of texts and explores how those texts get adapted, interpreted, and transformed – the “action” of the title – in different contexts. (For instance, classes may focus on how Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart influenced the development of an African literature or on Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven which references both Shakespeare's plays and contemporary comics.)  The assignments you will complete in English 102 will develop skills for writing about literature and for making research-based academic arguments in any discipline. 

This course will appeal to you if 

• You're interested in the way we've told stories over the centuries;
• You like to think about how literary traditions have been transformed over time;
• You want to sharpen your writing and speaking skills while discussing great works of literature;
• And/or you're considering an English major or minor.

ENSH 103 is for students interested in learning how to research and write and the university level through the study of contemporary literature. This course explores literature and other texts as cultural practices that address colonial power and privilege; emphasizes contemporary English-language texts, primarily by and about members of marginalized communities, on subjects such as Indigeneity, settlement, immigration and racialization, and develops foundations in textual and genre analysis and academic argument in relation to decolonial knowledge as well as research skills and APA citation.

This course will appeal to you if

• You’re interested in exploring texts from marginalized and racialized voices;
• You are interested in exploring contemporary literature through a decolonial lens;
• You want to sharpen your writing and speaking skills while discussing great works of literature;
• And/or you're considering an English major or minor.

ENGR 110 is intended for students who are

• Enrolled in an Engineering program
• Looking forward to completing a class that connects writing and research with engineering design projects.

If you’re enrolled (or planning to enrol) in first year Engineering, then this is the perfect course for you. It meets the university’s Academic Writing Requirement, while also meeting your needs and interests as engineering students. The course has been specially designed to integrate an Engineering Design Lab (1.0 credit)—taught by engineering faculty—with an Academic Writing component (1.5 credit), taught in computer labs by instructors from the Academic and Technical Writing Program.

On the Communications side, you’ll read and write about the design projects set for you on the Design side: you’ll analyze a range of readings on engineering topics, learn about the rhetorical conventions academic writers use, and apply these in your own writing.  Using prewriting, peer review, reflection, and revision, you’ll discover that, much like effective designs, effective writing that conveys its purpose clearly and concisely is an ongoing process. The unique synergy between these two sides of the course—Design and Communications—offers a rewarding, relevant way for you to develop the research, reading, and writing skills you need to succeed in your program and your chosen profession.

See sample Course Outline here.

Please note that this course is not open for credit to students who are registered in or have credit for any of the following: ENGR 111, ENGR 112, ELEC 199, ENGL 135, or ATWP 135