The Action Hub is our onsite common space where members can meet, brainstorm, write, and take other actions on what they have learned from convention panelists. This year’s Action Hub is jam-packed with opportunities to use, think about, and engage in writing as a strategy for action.
You’ll find stations devoted to incorporating writing in lively and engaging ways in your classroom, ways to use writing to communicate with audiences inside and outside of schools, opportunities to practice talking about writing, and more! You’ll also find stations sponsored by local Houston organizations, providing an opportunity for attendees to learn more about the vibrant and exciting Houston writing scene.
Stations in the Action Hub include (but are not limited to):
Knowledge Shaping
Work with others to turn research and knowledge from the field into messages for the broader public intended to change practices and result in action. Attendees can drop by during scheduled hours to consider how to share messages about research from our field with a wider audience. Attendees will work with others to, first, use a heuristic that asks them who the stakeholders are for this research-based issue and, second, design messages about the issue for those stakeholders using a variety of modes and media.
Examples of research-based topics that need to be shared with a wider audience might include dual enrollment, class size, assessment, etc. Examples of modes and media with which attendees can work include Buzzfeed, letters to the editor, Piktochart, white papers, press releases, Medium, etc. Attendees should come with the research-based ideas they want to work with and be ready to engage in invention and message-creation. Sponsored by the CCCC Research Committee.
Pitch Practicing
Practice talking to audiences outside of the field—whether faculty from other departments, administrators, community members, or others—about writing and writers. Pitch practicers are distinguished and experienced colleagues from the field who can play a variety of roles and provide feedback on your talking points. See the schedule to find out which pitch practicers will be available in what roles.
Writing for Change
In conjunction with 4Cs for Equality (4C4E), Writing for Change invites organizations and individuals to share their efforts to use their writing for positive change in their local communities, programs, classrooms, and the global community. Learn how to generate conversation with local, state, and federal policymakers via face to face contact and written communication.
Meet the CCCC Executive Committee
In addition to being a conference in the “get together once a year” sense, CCCC is also a conference of NCTE—a formal organization within the NCTE umbrella. Get to know the colleagues who currently serve as officers of the Conference on College Composition and Communication, share your concerns, ask questions, and/or learn more about how you can get involved!
HEROic Action
The CCCC Queer Caucus invites members to support the Houston LGBTQ community in response to the recent Houston Prop #1 Ordinance that has repealed equal rights measures. We will work with local area activists and politicians who will help us shape our letters to draw policymakers’ attention.
Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives
The DALN—the largest publicly accessible, online archive of first-hand literacy accounts in the world—will be on site to collect stories about participants’ literacy backgrounds. Please consider contributing to this valuable teaching, research, and archival resource.
The Writing Studies Tree
The WST is a crowdsourced database of academic genealogies in writing studies: links of mentoring, collaboration, education, and employment among people and places in the field. Come explore your connections and contribute to the WST’s ongoing efforts to map the field as a living network.
Undergraduate Research Focus Groups
We hope that both undergraduate researchers and those who mentor their work will join us for these focus groups, which explore the mentor-student relationship that anchors undergraduate research activity—a high-impact practice—in our disciplines. We’ll engage mentors and students in separate conversations, encouraging discussion about the work that is happening at various institutions, the forms it is taking, its impact, and how it can be further supported.
Since there is little public data regarding the impact of undergraduate research in our discipline, these focus groups are designed to help us talk about our individual and collective experiences with undergraduate research in our discipline, and then to take action to extend its reach.
C’s the Day
C’s the Day is a game that promotes a lively, active, and eccentric approach to 4Cs. By completing quests to earn the fabled Sparklepony, rhet/comp trading cards, and other prizes, we hope you’ll gain a new appreciation for how games and play can lead to real exploration, learning, and engagement. Play the game; win the conference!
Stations featuring Houston local organizations:
Writers in the Schools (WITS)
Flash pedagogies! Since 1983, WITS has been partnering with schools across Houston to bring the joy of writing to school-aged children. WITS also partners with teachers who want to incorporate creative and process-based writing into their highly structured, assessment-based curriculum. Visit WITS to participate in energetic and creative activities to help bring creative pedagogies to your writing classroom.
Inprint Poetry Buskers
The Inprint Poetry Buskers are a team of local poets, many of whom are graduate students and alumni from the nationally renowned UH Creative Writing Program. They spread the joy of poetry at festivals and special events throughout the city. These talented poets, using a typewriter and themes specified by attendees, tap into the muse of immediate inspiration and write poems on the spot for free. The buskers often read out the poems and sign them, which attendees can take home and cherish forever. Inprint—a nonprofit literary arts organization—has for more than three decades fostered the art of creative writing and inspired a vibrant community of readers and writers in Houston.
