Calderwood Seminars in Public Writing
Calderwood Seminars in Public Writing are advanced-level, writing-intensive courses that engage students in a review of their majors or areas of special interest. These seminars challenge students to integrate what they have learned in other courses and to communicate this knowledge to a broad audience. Calderwood seminars:
• Target juniors and seniors and empower a student’s “voice” in her major field or area of study;
• Emphasize public writing, rather than writing for a specialized and professional audience. Public writing—the ability to translate complex arguments and professional jargon to a broad audience—is a central feature of a liberal arts education and important to success beyond college;
• Encourage a more collaborative experience, with students writing frequently and rewriting their work in response to input from classmates who serve as peer-editors and comments by their professors.
The Calderwood Seminar program began at Wellesley College in 2013-14 and has grown rapidly. On average, ten seminars from across the disciplines are offered each year and enroll about 15 percent of a graduating class. The program is based on Economic Journalism, a course Professor Lindauer introduced to the Wellesley curriculum. The pedagogy he employed is used in all Calderwood Seminars. Professor Lindauer developed the program at Wellesley College, where it has been extensively evaluated, and is now expanding it to other colleges and universities.
The Calderwood Seminars in Public Writing are named after Stanford Calderwood, a patron of the arts and benefactor of Wellesley College. Throughout his career, Mr. Calderwood realized the value of written communication. To improve the capabilities of Wellesley College students as public writers, the Calderwood Charitable Foundation provided generous support for this program.