The items below, written for use by students, can be downloaded and then duplicated by Reprographics for distribution to the class. Or if you have a website for your course, you can download these items to your site. Please page through the resources yourself in case students have questions about them.

Note that some of the following documents require a PDF reader in order to download. Please click here to get the reader.

• Writing-intensive courses: what's in a name?

• Downloadable Resource Documents: Editing, Using and Acknowledging Sources, Plagiarism

Writing-intensive courses: what's in a name?

The City University advocates the use of writing in all courses (not just in English composition) because writing is integral to learning. It helps you to understand course concepts and applications, to analyze and connect ideas, and to remember more of what you’ve learned.

BMCC, like more than half the CUNY colleges, offers writing-intensive (WI) sections that use writing as a vehicle for learning. (These sections are not related to the developmental course called Intensive Writing, Eng 095.) Don’t be intimidated by the phrase “writing-intensive,” which is the term used at hundreds of colleges around the country. It simply means that teachers of WI sections assign a variety of short, informal writing-to-learn tasks and one or two formal papers, with an opportunity to revise after feedback from the teacher.

If you take a WI section:

You enhance your potential to learn.

You improve your ability to write.

You ready yourself for the challenges of a four-year college.

You strengthen your position in the job market (employers prize applicants who can communicate well on paper).

Finally – a very important side benefit – you help to prepare yourself for the CUNY Proficiency Exam (CPE), an academic literacy exam involving writing which every student must pass in order to receive a community-college diploma.

Note: sections not designated WI may also involve writing – for example, all courses in the English Department and many in Business Management and Social Science, as well as some in the Science Department. Writing is a normal component of learning in college.

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Resource Documents

The following documents are .pdf files, which are viewable using Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Editing: a mini-manual for writing across the curriculum (.pdf)
Using and acknowledging sources (.pdf)
BMCC policy statement on plagiarism (.pdf)

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