Writing Centres and Faculty Development: Collaboration in the Third Space

Melanie Doyle, Memorial University of Newfoundland
Carolyn Best, Memorial University of Newfoundland

Abstract

This case study examines how collaboration between a writing centre manager and an educational developer created new opportunities to advance writing pedagogy at a mid-sized Canadian university. Initially born from our university’s response to generative artificial intelligence, our effort both responds to perceived threats to the future of writing studies and attempts to preserve our work through new opportunities. Collaboration between writing centres and faculty development is under-represented in the literature, yet we have found the marginality of the third space to be a productive one from which to grow our campus’ writing community from “under the curriculum” (Hunt, 2006, p. 371). In this paper, we present three examples of collaborations between a writing centre manager and an educational developer—creating a community of practice, facilitating workshops for graduate students, and presenting to our university’s Senate. The outcomes of our reflections offer perspectives on AI and writing pedagogy, highlight the importance of cross-unit partnerships, and illustrate how third space professionals can offer critical writing-related perspectives to institutions where formal writing programs do not exist—ultimately helping make visible the often decentralized work of writing studies professionals in Canada.

Keywords: third space, writing centres, Canada, collaboration, faculty development, generative artificial intelligence

Introduction

The future of writing centres has been under scrutiny for nearly as long as writing centres have existed on university campuses (Riley, 1994). This has been particularly true of Canadian writing centres, whose staff, administrators, and metaphorical cheerleaders have “failed to convince” institutional leadership that writing centre work is valued and necessary (Paré, 2017, p. 2). As such, writing centre staff find themselves operating in the liminal “third space” of universities, straddling both academic and professional identities, constraints, and dilemmas. Increasingly de-professionalized, third space professionals like writing centre staff may have difficulty developing effective collaborations with colleagues across the university (Whitchurch, 2013). Indeed, Paré (2017) observes a persistent isolation among writing centre staff that has, in part, “made us complicit in our own marginalization” (p. 3). However, Abegglen, Burns, and Sinfield (2023) found that when colleagues across third spaces collaborate, they can increase personal feelings of agency and advance professional agendas.

This case study presents collaborative work between two third space colleagues, Carolyn, a writing centre manager, and Melanie, an educational developer, both working within a Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC) at a mid-size Canadian university. Our work began from shared interests in academic writing, but as the need for our university to respond to the pedagogical implications of generative AI, so did our effort to support student writers and the faculty who assess them. Our effort is thus both a response to perceived threats to the future of writing studies (Hicks, 2024) and an attempt to preserve our work through new collaborations.

Our collaboration builds on emerging discussions in the field about partnerships between writing centres and educational development offices. In a recent reflective piece for the Canadian Writing Centre Association, Hotson (2024) proposes that writing centres and educational development offices can collaborate to support faculty and students by delivering workshops and creating just-in-time resources. While we do engage in that work, we have also tried to embrace the marginality of the third space in order to grow our campus’ writing community through small actions that often go unnoticed, until slowly taking root within existing campus systems.

The purpose of this study is to examine how third space colleagues can create opportunities to advance writing pedagogy in higher educational settings in which no university-wide writing programs exist. In this paper, we share our experiences so far as well as other possible collaborations between our writing centre and faculty development that may continue to enrich our futures, that of our individual offices, and our university’s writing culture. Through our discussion of creating a community of practice, facilitating joint workshops, and presenting to our university’s Senate, we identify the nature of writing studies’ peripheral development in Canada as a key influence on our work, as well as the necessity of collaboration with less conventional partners and academic units in order to make the most of our third space locations. Ultimately, through this work, we have significantly contributed to the writing landscape of our institution through increased visibility and have increased our sense of professional agency.

Our Context

Our university is a comprehensive institution serving approximately 18,000 undergraduate and 4,500 graduate students, with degrees offered at the bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral levels. Students come from a mix of rural, local, and international backgrounds, many as first-generation university attendees. Like many Canadian institutions, we are facing ongoing challenges related to budget constraints, rapid turnover amongst senior leadership, declining enrolment, and broader pressures of austerity. This context shapes the day-to-day teaching and learning work we do, as well as organizational decision making. One of the more recent organizational changes greatly impacted the writing centre.

In September 2022, our campus writing centre was moved under the umbrella of our university’s TLC. This move was the third organizational shift in a few short years following the retirement of the centre’s long-serving director—from the Provost’s office, to the English as a Second Language Department, then briefly to the Internationalization Office before landing under the TLC. Frequent relocation or reclassification of writing centres is not uncommon (Giltrow, 2016), and scholarship on writing centre location points to problems that can arise when centres are “nested” under other administrative units (Girgensohn, 2018). For example, Perdue and Driscoll (2017) found that when centres are housed within larger learning centres, writing centre staff typically have to contend with administration that “neither understand how writing tutoring differs from other subject tutoring nor appreciate the specialized writing knowledge needed to effectively facilitate tutorials” (p. 201). This is a growing trend in Canada, according to Paré (2017), who writes of the disappearance of writing centres into “student services, learning commons, and academic support units” (p. 2). Despite these documented challenges, our experience has complicated this narrative.

Since the writing centre’s integration into our university’s TLC, Carolyn has found the relationship to be quite positive, noting the stability and support she and the centre have under the TLC. She feels the organizational move has enhanced the reach and impact of the writing centre across the university. Through inclusion in pan-university surveys and university-wide communications, the centre’s services and resources have gained broader visibility among students and faculty. The TLC also provided direct access to the campus’ learning management system, which is now used to streamline and enhance the peer writing tutor training program. Additionally, the TLC has provided the exciting possibility of professional video production and advertising to further promote the writing centre and its offerings. Melanie, who has been working as an educational developer with the TLC since 2020, had mixed feelings when she heard that the writing centre was joining the unit. With her own professional history in writing centre studies she was, on one hand, wary that the writing centre would be de-professionalized or potentially face “programmatic doom” under the TLC (Basgier, 2023, p. 75); however, she was also excited for potential opportunities to work more closely with the writing centre, something she had been interested in doing since starting in the educational developer role (Doyle, 2024). In discussing our work together over the past few years, we have both come to recognize that had the writing centre not moved under the TLC, it is unlikely we would have connected as the writing centre and faculty development office typically do not engage in collaborative work with one another.

We finally connected in July 2023 as our university was preparing for a new academic year in which the threats and possible opportunities of generative artificial intelligence (AI) were impossible to ignore. Although our roles are quite different, we found ourselves grappling with similar concerns: Carolyn was worried how students would respond to the deluge of new generative AI tools targeted at developing writers; and Melanie was worried instructors, fearful of academic misconduct, would embrace inequitable writing assessment practices or eliminate writing-to-learn activities from their classes. Ultimately, we were both eager to support students’ writing development at a time when that development felt particularly threatened.

In our respective roles, we do not always have the opportunity to share space with faculty to discuss how to best support student writing development. Our university does not have a formal writing program. Instead, writing instruction takes place in courses across various disciplinary units. This disconnect prevents students from having a standardized framework within which to learn effective writing principles. Although Melanie works closely with faculty and instructors to develop their teaching practices, it is often on a consultation basis when an instructor needs support with an individual assessment or learning activity. In other words, her work is often reactive in nature and does not regularly offer opportunities to consult on program-wide curriculum. Most days, she feels akin to a “fix-it” shop—called upon to discuss an assignment or teaching practice when something isn’t working. Carolyn, through the writing centre, primarily serves students, and her relationship with faculty and instructors is somewhat peripheral unless they intentionally seek help or resources. When invited by faculty, Carolyn will present on the writing centre and its services in classrooms, but even in those faculty-initiated interactions, students often remain the primary audience. However, as our university, and, more specifically, the TLC in which we work, tried to respond to and prepare for the challenges posed by generative AI, we increasingly found ourselves moving outside our typical roles to share new space with faculty and university leadership. Our shared passion for and background in writing pedagogy made us eager to step into these new spaces in an attempt to centre writing in ongoing conversations around generative AI.

Theoretical Framework: The Third Space in Higher Education

The “third space” refers to roles and identities that exist between traditional binaries and in our case, between academic and professional spheres in universities. Conceptually, the third space has been used as a framework to study perceived binaries across communities and spatial geographies since the 1970s and thus has roots in social theories pertaining to cultural studies and social capital (Bell, 1976; Said, 1978). However, within higher education, the third space was termed and popularized by Whitchurch (2008) to discuss spaces, roles, and identities that straddle both professional and academic spheres. Such roles typically provide academic expertise as well as administrative or professional services. Library and information specialists, research grant coordinators, and learning technologists, for example, have all been found to hold a blend of academic and professional credentials and day-to-day responsibilities (Whitchurch, 2013, p. 49). While their roles include many academic elements, individuals in these roles tend to hold non-academic titles and contracts (Whitchurch, 2013, p. 50). This is true for many professionals in writing centre leadership and in faculty development.

The majority of writing centre managers or directors, 71% in 2014 according to Isaacs and Knight, held administrative, non-tenurable positions (p. 48). These individuals typically have a PhD or master’s degree (Valles et al., 2017). While running a writing centre includes tasks like accounting and hiring and monitoring staff, non-tenure track leadership also participate in academic activities such as research, curriculum development, program design, and committee service (Geller & Denny, 2013, pp. 109–111). Combined, these activities reflect both the administrative and academic responsibilities of writing centre leadership, regardless of title. It may be easy to assume that academic or tenure-track writing centre positions—those out of the third space—are inherently “better.”

Geller and Denny’s (2013) study on the career trajectories of writing centre professionals complicates this assumption. Without the looming pressure of reaching tenure, non-academic writing centre staff are found to have higher job satisfaction and more freedom to devote to developing their centres. However, these same staff acknowledge the lack of credibility their position affords (p. 106). Poignantly, the authors wonder why so many writing centre professionals “had such satisfying everyday teaching and learning lives and so much professional success in positions that are considered by their peers to have such low status that they can’t claim being ‘true’ or ‘legitimate’ professionals in an academic field?” (p. 123). This question captures the many paradoxes of the third space. Indeed, third space professionals across higher education have been found to embrace the flexibility and individuality their roles offer, yet dilemmas concerning credibility and institutional clout persist (Whitchurch, 2013, pp. 91–92).

Faculty development staff such as educational developers (sometimes also called faculty developers or academic developers) face similar realities. Educational developers often embody hybrid identities, and metaphors of marginality are common in literature on the field (Green & Little, 2013; Manathunga, 2007). Not only do individuals in these roles occupy a liminal space between tenure-track faculty and upper administration, but, as Little and Green (2015) point out, they also straddle disciplinary boundaries. Occupying these in-between spaces creates internal tension as developers navigate their disciplinary identities and administrative duties while performing the “work an academic undertakes,” such as research, leadership, and institutional service (Little & Green, 2022, p. 813).

One characteristic of the third space is that it is both a safe and risky environment in which to operate (Whitchurch, 2013). The third space is safe in that staff are typically relieved of high-stress organizational pressures, leaving ample room for creativity and flexibility (Green & Little, 2013; Whitchurch, 2013). However, such freedoms and boundlessness can also be “threatening or dysfunctional,” and thus risky (Whitchurch, 2013, p. 84). Navigating these spaces requires innovative thinking and a willingness to push beyond institutional silos, while still negotiating the values and priorities of the larger unit. Fortunately, staff within the third space readily enter risky spaces and embrace an “edginess” necessary to foster connections and transcend the isolation that is otherwise pervasive in these environments (Whitchurch, 2013, p. 85-86). When supported by other third space colleagues, staff can better embrace the marginality of the third space.

For us, the third space is not only a theoretical framework but the daily reality of our work. Our positions exist in liminal zones where we often feel both inside and outside the academic core, a condition that shapes the possibilities for collaboration described in this paper. For Melanie, the third space is experienced in the absence of a clear disciplinary “home.” Following a master’s degree in composition/rhetoric, she is completing her PhD in post-secondary education, and while her own research and teaching is rooted in academic writing, her role as an educational developer requires her to work across disciplinary boundaries to support faculty from nursing, engineering, and every discipline in between. This role affords opportunities to convene cross-disciplinary conversations about pedagogy, which she greatly enjoys, but it also raises questions of credibility because she does not hold a tenure-track position and still faces frustrating precarity as a contractual employee. As manager of the writing centre, Carolyn feels that her presence in the third space is characterized by the perception that her position is primarily administrative. This perception overshadows the academic nature of her work, which involves significant disciplinary and writing studies expertise. Nevertheless, her academic credentials and experience—a master’s degree in applied language studies with a focus on writing development and her extensive teaching experience—are often overlooked. Without a formalized platform to collaborate with faculty and staff, she occupies a third space where her scholarly knowledge exists but is not institutionally recognized—limiting her influence within the academic community. Together, these third space positions create the conditions for our collaboration, and as well-supported in the literature, come with certain strengths.

Strengths of Liminal Space

The literature on writing centres and educational development consistently highlights several strengths of liminal or third-space positioning, including agility, critical distance, and the capacity to influence institutional change. For example, referencing the often-peripheral space of campus writing centres—both physically and organizationally—Paré (2017) suggests that these locations may grant opportunities, particularly relating to practitioner-led research. Indeed, writing centre staff in the third space are able to “operate beyond the radar or off the grid of faculty culture and protocol” (Geller & Denny, 2013, p. 114). Writing centre professionals have had to embrace marginality in this way for decades. Sunstein (1998), for example, describes a writing centre that, when faced with severe budget cuts, successfully rebranded itself to secure renewed support while quietly preserving its core ethos. Such agility is necessary for writing centres given high rates of institutional interference (Giltrow, 2016), an affordance supported, if not fully granted, by the invisibility of the third space. The writing centre can make the nimble moves required due to its “always peripheral” status (Paré, 2017, p. 2). While this may not be the approach writing centre professionals would prefer, given its “time-consuming, labor-intensive” nature (Giaimo, 2020, p. 6) it can still offer success in situations where we otherwise lack institutional power or funding (Paré, 2017).

For educational developers, Green and Little (2013) offer a careful theoretical analysis of the marginality of the field. By existing on the margins, educational developers are both peripheral and vital, as this liminal homeland empowers them to offer more “constructively critical” perspectives (Green & Little, 2013, p. 535), which are often needed in our institutions. Other scholars (Fremstad et al., 2020; Peseta, 2014) similarly highlight the potential for educational developers to challenge traditional practices and structures in higher education and influence educational change. Drawing on the work of Kandlbinder (2007), Fremstad et al. (2020) position this work as “deliberative” practice, taking place in an inherently political space between university leadership and the wider academic community. Like deliberation, which Kandlbinder (2007) defines as “a demanding form of communication that . . . offers significant benefits to those who make decisions on the behalf of others” (p. 55), Green and Little (2013) consider their work to be “collegial provoc[ation]” (p. 535). In other words, from the margins, educational developers can critically evaluate and challenge assumptions to enhance colleagues’ thinking (Green & Little, 2013). They can be the “devil’s advocate,” freely making bold “suggestions on policies in the full knowledge that other voices are likely to eclipse [theirs]” (Green & Little, 2013, p. 535). Taking action through these suggestions—through deliberative communication—can further establish their agency on university campuses and contribute to institutional change (Fremstad et al., 2020). In this way, educational developers like writing centre leadership, affirm their location on the margins to advance educational goals, or in our case, writing goals.

While the literature discusses third space advantages broadly, we are particularly interested in how these positions enable advancement of writing pedagogy specifically. Recognizing the strengths of liminal spaces, and seeing our own experiences reflected in the literature, we have come to embrace the third space dimension of our roles and work in the writing centre and the faculty development office. Such an embrace has revealed further advantages to marginality, namely more widespread opportunities to support writing development on our campus, to convene cross-campus conversations about AI and writing, to influence institutional policy discussions, and to build collaborative networks that would be difficult to establish through traditional academic channels. As we discuss in the later sections of this paper, our third space identities granted us a level of agility and “constructively critical” perspectives (Green & Little, 2013, p. 535) to make these moments meaningful from “under the curriculum” (Hunt, 2006, p. 371).

Collaboration Under the Curriculum

What does it mean to support writing development from under the curriculum? Hunt (2006) used this phrase to contrast the prominent writing across the curriculum movement of the United States to the more obscure, often hidden, writing instruction taking place at Canadian universities. While writing instruction in the United States is often easily identified by multiple sections of Composition 101, large numbers of graduate students training to teach those courses, and cross-curricular initiatives that seek to build on their work, there is no equivalent of these “mammoth programs” in the Canadian context (Hunt, 2006, p. 371). In this way, Hunt’s (2006) playful phrase is more than a concept or useful framing device. Instead, it represents the disciplinary reality of engaging in the often-invisible world of Canadian writing studies (Humphreys et al., 2024).

It is worth noting that our university does not have robust infrastructure to support students’ writing development. Writing support thus emerges in smaller, piecemeal ways: a writing centre housed in the TLC; a handful of discipline-specific writing courses scattered across departments with no overarching program or home unit; a first-year literature course required of nearly all undergraduates; and occasional faculty-led initiatives that grow reactively from committee work and often dissipate quickly. Although writing instruction takes place, it does so in ways that are not always legible to dominant perspectives on university writing instruction. This is not uncommon for Canadian institutions. Graves and Graves’ (2006) seminal collection perhaps documents this fact most clearly, in its examination of the “baffling variety of writing courses, centres, programs, and degrees offered at Canadian universities” (p. 1). Canadian postsecondary writing instruction commonly exists on the margins, scattered programs existing in isolation having emerged from fortuitous interdisciplinary connections (Clary-Lemon, 2009). In essence, the American model of writing instruction does not often fit “in the traditional departmental and administrative structures” of Canadian universities; those eager to advance writing pedagogy therefore must “infiltrat[e] the cracks, fin[d] housing in administrative units, other departments, writing centres, various ad hoc creations of deans and provosts” (Hunt, 2006, p. 376). This is the scattered landscape in which we find ourselves.

To “make the most of” our context (Hunt, 2006, p. 380) and to leverage the opportunities it grants (Paré, 2017), we collaborated on several projects during the 2023–2024 academic year that continued to sow seeds of writing instruction from under the curriculum. These include the creation of a community of practice, the delivery of workshops to graduate students, and a presentation we were invited to give to our university’s Senate. In the following section, we outline these projects and unpack how each was, in part, afforded by our third space location and work to enhance our campus’ writing community and our sense of professional agency.

Connection through a Community of Practice

To respond to the growing concerns among instructors on our campus regarding the use of generative AI, we decided to host an informal coffee break in our TLC prior to the start of the Fall 2023 semester. Over 70 people attended and participated in an earnest conversation about their hopes, fears, and plans relating to generative AI and their upcoming course assignments. While this session met its objectives of sparking discussion, sharing ideas, and providing space for some healthy commiseration, we recognized the need for continued conversation, so we launched a community of practice (CoP) on generative AI and teaching the following semester. This was our first attempt to create a sustained, cross-campus space for dialogue around AI, and it set the stage for much of the collaborative work we have undertaken since. The community first consisted primarily of faculty who had attended the coffee break, but it has since grown through word of mouth and is now composed of faculty, staff, sessional instructors, and graduate students from various departments. Each month, we organize and host a meeting focused on one specific aspect relating to generative AI and teaching, usually with a rotating chair.

CoPs are fertile sites for third space professionals. Our positions are often less “bounded” than that of our faculty and staff colleagues (Whitchurch, 2008, p. 8); as such, we are able to reach across departments and units and take on work that, on the surface, may seem outside the scope of our job descriptions. This is because our work is often more concerned with networks of people and activities than with defined roles (Wenger, 1998). Whitty (2000) notes that third space professionals thrive on collegial and professional engagement, like that which CoPs foster. CoPs are also thought to be effective ways for third space professionals to build professional capital (Hockey & Allen-Collinson, 2009) and enhance their academic skill set, particularly relating to research (Veles & Carter, 2016). For Melanie, these benefits have been particularly impactful given that she has only been at the university for a few years. Her involvement in the CoP has helped grow her professional network on campus quite quickly and has provided ample opportunity to gain leadership experience that may otherwise not have occurred until later in her career. In addition to networking, Carolyn’s involvement in the CoP has enabled her to explore instructional challenges and develop AI literacy training for tutors. This knowledge enables tutors to more effectively support students in using AI tools appropriately in their academic writing, while also helping them understand how to meet academic expectations when AI use is restricted or not permitted. More broadly, the CoP on generative AI and teaching has allowed us both to “create new professional spaces, knowledges, and relationships” (Whitchurch, 2008, p. 379). Although neither of us holds a faculty position or has the capacity in our individual roles to construct a strong writing culture at our institution, we can now help strengthen our institution’s writing culture by sharing our expertise on writing pedagogy in this group setting.

As a writing centre manager, Carolyn entered the early conversations of the CoP with a focus on how students’ writing development might be supported or undermined by AI, particularly when disciplinary faculty were uncertain about how to address it in their courses. And as an educational developer, Melanie’s orientation was broader. She was concerned with how AI intersected with teaching and assessment practices related to writing. These complementary perspectives meant that faculty participants were able to engage with AI both as a pedagogical challenge and as a writing challenge, a balance that neither of us could have provided alone. Of course, writing is not the main focus of the CoP, but we do feel compelled to ensure that students’ writing development occupies a central place in discussions surrounding the use of AI, and the CoP is one way we have been able to do that. Wenger (1998) notes that “we all have our own theories and ways of understanding the world, and our communities of practice are places where we develop, negotiate, and share them” (p. 48). Through the CoP, our theories of writing come to bear on conversations about generative AI, as they relate to academic integrity, research, and assessment, among other topics.

While the CoP was our entry point into AI conversations on campus, we hope that it will continue giving us the collegial grounding and visibility to take on more public-facing and higher-stakes roles. We have already had some success in this area. For example, a group of CoP members, including Melanie, were invited to give a plenary at a Teaching and Learning Conference in May 2024 to share the group’s conversations with a wider network. As the CoP continues to grow, we look forward to developing wider networks across academic units with whom we typically do not have the opportunity to build relationships and working to raise the profile of our units.

Critical Instruction through a Graduate Student Workshop

Building on the grassroots energy of the CoP, our next opportunity to collaborate came through a formal invitation from the School of Graduate Studies to deliver a workshop to graduate students on AI. The School of Graduate Studies at our institution hosts dozens of presentations and workshops each semester for registered graduate students. Topics include academic skills development, workplace readiness, and research support, among others, and we have both presented individually in the past, representing our respective units.

In the Winter 2024 semester, we were asked to deliver a workshop to graduate students on AI, with the proposed title of “Utilizing Artificial Intelligence in the Classroom.” Given our background in writing pedagogy, the direction suggested in that title did not necessarily “sit well” with us. While we recognize that many graduate students will likely use generative AI throughout their education (Wood & Moss, 2024), we remain concerned by the threat over-reliance may pose to students’ writing development and intellectual growth. Writing is not just about producing a final product; it is a critical process of thinking, developing ideas, and engaging deeply with learning material (Elbow, 1998; Emig, 1977). When students rely too heavily on AI, they risk missing out on the cognitive benefits of writing, such as clarifying their thoughts, exploring different perspectives, and refining their arguments (Emig, 1977). Over time, this can weaken their ability to think critically and communicate effectively, skills that are essential not only in academic settings but also in their future professional lives (Bean & Melzer, 2021).

Instead of focusing solely on practical generative AI applications, we focused our session on “Developing Critical AI Literacy as a Graduate Student.” In the workshop, we reviewed Long and Magerko’s (2020) AI literacy framework and engaged graduate students in debate: will tools like ChatGPT streamline academic publishing and help researchers produce better, more efficient writing (Khalifa & Albadawy, 2024); or will tools like ChatGPT distance writers from processes of critical thinking and self-discovery (Yagelski, 2009) and limit their development of authorial voice and writerly identity (Badenhorst et al., 2015)? In this way, we were able to more effectively support students to understand their writing process, reflect on the ethical implications of AI use, and consider how AI might relate to the role and value of writing in their disciplinary epistemologies. Our workshop thus took a different turn from the direction originally presented to us by the School of Graduate Studies. Although this decision could be seen as risky, emblematic of the third space (Whitchurch, 2013), we felt empowered to make this change due to the nimble nature of our roles; we are not directly accountable to the School of Graduate Studies, so we were able to tailor the session as we saw appropriate given our expertise. Activities in the third space often display such “hybridity” and “flexibility” (Taylor, 2008, p. 38) that require a certain “edginess” (Whitchurch, 2013, pp. 85–86).

This workshop also allowed us to further disperse writing pedagogy from under the curriculum. Workshops and presentations have long been considered tantamount to the work of both educational developers (Amundsen et al., 2005) and writing centre staff (Giltrow, 2016). However, this element of our work is also readily critiqued. Since the 1980s, scholars have suggested that educational development workshops, aimed at enhancing the pedagogical knowledge and practices of university faculty, are unlikely to “produce lasting changes in teaching behaviour or lasting impact on students” (Levinson-Rose & Menges, 1981, p. 419). Paré (2017) similarly argues that writing centre professionals have “conspired to lower [their] own status” by offering workshops and one-off presentations, often at the request of colleagues who neither understand nor value the ethos and pedagogy at the core of the writing centre (p. 3).

We, too, struggle with the repeated requests for workshops, presentations, and webinars. Well-meaning colleagues invite us to speak and share quick, practical solutions that will lead to better teachers and stronger writers. While we do not hold such miracle cures (Paré, 2017), we hesitate to say no and turn down the invitation. As third space professionals, we are eager to raise our professional capital and to strengthen the collegial networks on which we depend (Hockey & Allen-Collinson, 2009). So, like Paré (2017), we “do the work, all the time consoling ourselves that we will eventually correct general misunderstandings . . . [and] implement the deep and widespread strategies that are really needed” (p. 4).

To be fair, our workshop on “Developing Critical AI Literacy as a Graduate Student” did not radically alter the state of writing or generative AI on our campus; rather, it was our attempt to reject the “tips and tricks” workshop we often give, in order to begin to engage in the more critical, widespread work that is much needed. Had we been working alone, this subversion may not have happened, but we found power through collaboration that enabled us to prepare and facilitate the session “our way.” Melanie found this collaboration to be particularly important because prior to it, the School of Graduate Studies had only invited her to present to graduate students on teaching-related topics like balancing responsibilities as a teaching assistant or preparing a teaching dossier. Partnering with Carolyn has helped expand Melanie’s profile and allow others on campus to see her range of expertise more fully. Carolyn’s previous presentations for the School of Graduate Studies primarily focused on plagiarism prevention and how the writing centre could support students. In contrast, the collaboration with Melanie positioned the writing centre as a collaborative academic partner rather than solely a student support service.

The workshop also marked a shift in our overarching collaborative efforts regarding both audience and stakes, for the workshop required us to step into an explicitly instructional role with graduate students unlike the CoP which is faculty-led and more exploratory in nature. We were fortunately invited back by the School of Graduate Studies to offer another workshop on developing AI literacies and received positive feedback from both the moderator and several students in attendance. Melanie was also asked to facilitate additional training workshops related to generative AI for the School of Graduate Studies’ TA Training Program, a program we had not previously supported. We hope to continue seeing positive outcomes emerge from this experience.

Visibility through a University Senate Presentation

The collaborative arch of 2023-2024 culminated in March 2024, when we moved from faculty and graduate student audiences to the university’s highest governing body. Our university Senate asked the TLC where we work to give a presentation during a special meeting of the Senate to help guide the university’s response to AI. Following a meeting in which our management discussed the key messaging to be relayed in that senate presentation, we were selected to give this presentation. By Winter 2024, we had gained somewhat of a reputation in our TLC of being “the AI people”, so the invitation was not a complete surprise. While neither of us claim to be experts on generative AI, we do keep inserting ourselves into AI-related conversations to ensure that there is a writing studies voice at the table, so we happily obliged with an eager, “Let’s do it.”

In our third space roles, we typically do not have the agency or venue to share our knowledge and experiences with university leadership like the provost and president. But through this presentation, we had the opportunity to guide conversation and direction at our institution’s highest level based on the perceived expertise we have developed around generative AI. We used this opportunity to do a few things, but the crux of our argument was two-fold: instead of top-down, punitive policy related to generative AI, academic departments should identify flexible positions on AI based on the unique ways their disciplines position writing as a meaning-making practice; and this process should prioritize the creation of supports that help students and faculty develop the critical AI literacy skills they need to make informed decisions around possible AI use. In sum, our “constructively critical” perspective (Little & Green, 2015, p. 535) was that in response to generative AI, administrators, instructors, and student support centres need to centre good writing pedagogy rather than move toward high-stakes, in-class writing out of fear of academic misconduct.

Like our workshop for the School of Graduate Studies, this presentation to the Senate was somewhat “risky” (Whitchurch, 2013, p. 84). Although we felt emboldened by the freedom we were granted in the invitation to speak to our institution’s highest governing body, such freedom can feel threatening to third space professionals. As we have both experienced, conversations about writing instruction—in and beyond the writing centre—entail “a certain amount of risk,” particularly when speaking with institutional members who are not familiar with critical theory, New Literacy Studies, the process movement, and other influential writing pedagogies (Carter, 2009, pp. 135–136). Carter (2009) recognizes that any pushback we might hope to offer from the third space exists within very real “material, political, and ideological conditions,” conditions that often work to enforce dominant social paradigms within our academic institutions (p. 136). Educational developers are aware of this as well. Even when they have been invited by senior academic leadership—like a university Senate—to contribute to institutional initiatives, educational developers have been found to carry a continual awareness of “consequent risks to [their] integrity” (Sugrue et al., 2018, p. 2347). And what is that risk? Although Carter (2009) writes specifically of writing centre staff, her analysis of paradoxes applies to third space professionals more broadly: “we represent the student, not the teacher. We represent the system, not the student. We represent neither, and we represent both” (p. 136). As such, we risk alienating students, staff, and colleagues across multiple levels, a risk heightened by the precarious nature of our positions.

Given the importance of our Senate presentation, the risk was worth it for us, as it often is for third space professionals. Little and Green (2015) describe this risk-taking as the role of “collegial provocateur[s],” professionals who raise difficult questions and challenge dominant thinking (p. 535). The confidence to take such positions, they argue, comes when third space professionals embrace their liminal location, taking “openly marginal position[s]” to offer the “constructively critical” perspectives needed on campus (p. 535). For us, this Senate presentation was arguably the most openly marginal we have been in our roles, countering the dominant discourse on generative AI. At a time when university administrators were overwhelmingly occupied by the threat AI poses to academic integrity (Perkins & Roe, 2024), we aimed to disrupt the common “ban or embrace” polarity and steer conversations toward needed student support. Rather than focus on academic misconduct and punitive measures, we advocated for developing students’ literacies relating to AI while emphasizing the value of writing to learn, process-based pedagogies, and writing as an epistemology tied to disciplinary ways of knowing. Given that our campus does not have university-wide writing programs or departments, there is little shared language with which to discuss writing pedagogy. We typically only have these conversations on a much smaller scale, Carolyn with writing tutors and Melanie with an individual course instructor. In our presentation on generative AI, we shone a light on the role writing plays in these conversations, granting greater visibility to writing pedagogy than is typically present at similar high-profile venues within our institution.

We were initially unsure how this presentation was received given the formality of the venue, but a few attendees later approached us to thank us for our contribution, and small seeds seem to have sprouted from our talk. Since the presentation, Carolyn is continuing to meet with university leadership to position the writing centre as a valued contributor to student success, and from her perspective, our presentation was a small but significant step, as the writing centre rarely has a presence at such a high-level conversation, and the fact that the centre was acknowledged suggested movement. Additionally, Melanie has been asked to contribute to a curriculum review project examining undergraduate writing courses in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences. For her, the session underscored the potential of third space work. While grateful for the opportunity, she also felt the weight of speaking as an outsider whose recommendations could potentially translate into institutional change. Taken together, these reflections point to both the opportunities of being third space professionals and how this collaboration has helped to increase our sense of professional agency during a time when the future of writing studies is increasingly called into question. Our collaborations have enabled us to expand our visibility as bona fide writing specialists, allowing us to contribute to discussions around writing within our institution. This may not have been possible without our partnership. And while we have not yet seen institutional policy changes, we are heartened that conversations continue.

Concluding Thoughts

Summarizing the breadth of responses to generative AI in higher education, Hicks (2024) questions the “role writing centers should play—or whether they will be needed in the future” (para. 2). Yet the future of writing centres has been doubted throughout our disciplinary history (Paré, 2017; Riley, 1994). Rather than fear these newest threats, we have aimed to preserve and advance our work through collaborative opportunities. Indeed, the rapid launch of generative AI has allowed us to join conversations and enter spaces to which we are not typically invited. We have embraced our third space roles in order to take risks and offer critical perspectives that centre writing in these conversations. These conversations have taken place with disciplinary faculty across departments through the CoP, with students who are typically more interested in “fix it” based writing support, and with our university’s highest governing body. Broadly speaking, we have tried to embrace our third space roles to further the writing agenda at our university.

From our work to date, there are at least two salient lessons that will continue to guide our efforts and that may be of value to colleagues beyond our institution. Firstly, we hope to continue and grow our collaborative efforts, both with one another and our wider network. Although it can be difficult for third space professionals to establish effective collaborations (Whitchurch, 2013), we believe that collaboration is an essential component of developing our professional practice. Further, we recognize that neither of us would have begun the work outlined in this paper had we not found in one another a like-minded collaborator. Abegglen, Burns, and Sinfield (2023) argue that when third space colleagues collaborate, they can increase personal sense of agency and advance professional agendas, and we have both found that to be true. Melanie, for example, feels empowered by her strengthened connection to the writing centre. Because her educational developer role is generalist in nature, she has often worried about being perceived as overreaching in her efforts to focus on writing instruction on campus. She wonders, “Will colleagues who are unfamiliar with my background think I’m out of my depth?” “Will I be seen as stepping on toes?” She feels the connection helps legitimize the pedagogical support she was already offering, and in concert with the writing centre, plans to seek out and establish more writing-related curriculum projects in her educational developer role. Carolyn, too, feels that this partnership has amplified the writing centre’s voice in academic conversations, positioning it as a key contributor in writing instruction rather than simply a support service. She plans to continue working with faculty, student services and other departments to give the centre a broader voice to help create more holistic support systems. Third space professionals should thus continue to find and collaborate with one another, as this work can not only support their own professional development but may also benefit students. While writing centre staff and educational developers may not appear to be likely partners, Hotson (2024) reminds us that we do not have to be solitary in our efforts and proposes other potential collaborators for writing centre professionals, such as student wellness centres, student unions, and campus health and safety offices. These recommendations can help guide our future work as we seek to continue to expand our network.

Secondly, we have been reminded that our work is inextricable from writing studies’ disciplinary history in Canada. Although writing centre professionals outside of Canada similarly embody roles and activities common in the third space (Geller & Denny, 2013), writing centres exist uniquely on the margins in Canada given the lack of a unified approach to writing instruction in our country (Clary-Lemon, 2009; Humphreys et al., 2024; Paré, 2017). As such, our efforts to develop a campus writing culture can only, for now, take place under the curriculum as “knowledge about academic writing in what is now called Canada is disparate, decentralized, and all but invisible” (Humphreys et al., 2024, p. 7). Indeed, as Humphreys et al. (2024) observe, “because so much of the knowledge production by writing studies experts in what is now called Canada is either siloed or shared outside of traditional publishing and knowledge networks,” even the work of documenting and circulating writing practices is uneven (p. 9).

Against this backdrop, our paper can be read as a modest contribution to making such work more visible. By describing three collaborative efforts that may appear simple on the surface, we aim to participate in the ongoing project of documenting and circulating how writing support emerges under the curriculum in Canadian universities. In this sense, our paper not only narrates our local interventions but also contributes to the broader project of knowledge production in Canadian writing studies. Fortunately, we have found the third space to be a uniquely opportune position to take up this work and “infiltrat[e] the cracks” of our institution to meet these goals (Hunt, 2006, p. 376). As we have described in this paper, we have been able to leverage our roles to find our way into more privileged spaces and offer needed critical perspectives related to writing.

Of course, we recognize that our case study comes with several limitations. Because we work in the same unit within a single university, our experiences may not resemble or be applicable to colleagues at other institutions. Further, this paper focuses primarily on initiating collaboration and our experiences so far, so we can not yet offer insight into the long-term impact of our work or comment on any shift in the writing culture at our institution. Through continued efforts, we hope that will change as we do believe that collaboration is fundamental to the development of professional practice within the third space.

For third space professionals, we recommend partnering with other such colleagues for support and to broaden networks. Doing so can help increase credibility and influence across the institution. For institutional leaders, we recommend engaging support units and other third space individuals in conversation when developing institutional goals and policies. These professionals can offer unique perspectives based on their experiences working in liminal spaces.

Our three collaborations—creating a community of practice, facilitating workshops for graduate students, and presenting to our university’s senate—have allowed us to strengthen our units’ footing through wider networks and an increased view of our expertise. Going forward, we will continue to raise consciousness around the need for sustained writing support. Given our extended networks and greater visibility, we plan to work more closely with departments and faculty particularly around curriculum development in order to further grow our campus’ writing culture into the future.

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