Department of EnglishFirst-Year Writing

Research in First-Year Writing

Interested in coming to TTU for Grad School? Curious about research opportunities in Writing Studies for graduate students?

The First-Year Writing Program at TTU has an active research agenda and opportunities for graduate student engagement. In addition to collaborative publications and conference presentations (see below), the FYW Program offers a number of other opportunities to get involved in research and scholarship:

• If you're interested in doing administrative work within the program, the Assistant Director of College Writing and Rhetoric positions are available every academic year for advanced PhD students/candidates. These positions include developing curriculum, leading workshops, supporting orientations, providing assistance to teachers in the program, conducting research over the program, and more.
• The FYW Program also has ongoing pilot studies over programmatic initiatives. Prior and current research includes GPTI experiences, innovative and new FYW assignments, alternate assessment practices, and more.
• Have an idea for research in FYW you want to present on? Let's talk about it! Email the Director of College Writing and Rhetoric, Dr. Alison Wells, to schedule an appointment to talk through your ideas: alison.wells@ttu.edu.
• Not ready for a conference presentation yet? There are opportunities to share your expertise via FYW-sponsored workshops and lectures to others in the FYW program at TTU.

These are just some of the ways the FYW Program is supporting graduate student research, but we would love to hear ideas that go beyond those listed above. If you have an idea for research or want to get involved, we'd love to talk!

Publications and Conference Presentations in FYW

Bolded names below are current or former faculty or graduate students in the Department of English.

Selected Publications

Kostelich, Callie F., Jacob Weston, Josephine Lawson, and Sam Littman. "Ethics of Inclusion: Piloting Grading Contracts in FYW at Texas Tech University." Social Justice WPAing, edited by Lilian Mina and Dominic DelliCarpini, forthcoming.

Kostelich, Callie F., Josephine Lawson, Maeve Kirk, Jak Emerson Kurdi, and Michael J. Faris. "Feminist Mentoring of Graduate Instructors through a First-Year Writing Lecture-Discussion Model." Reimagining Graduate Education in Writing Studies: Sustainable, Equitable, and Inclusive Approaches, edited by Kirsti Cole and Sarah Henderson Lee, forthcoming.

Flahive, Michelle. "Testimonio as a Methodology for Examining Marginalized Experiences with Mentorship." Mentorship/ Methodology: Reflections, Praxis, and Futures, edited by Leigh Gruwell and Charlie Lesh, Utah Street UP, 2024.

Lawson, Josephine, and Michael J. Faris. "Ecologies, Bodies, and OWI Teacher Preparation: Reflecting on a Practicum for Graduate Instructors Teaching Writing Online. Computers and Composition, vol. 74, 2004.

Das, Meghalee, and Michael J. Faris. "Peer Review in Online, Real-Time Learning Environments." Better Practices: Exploring the Teaching of Writing in Online and Hybrid Spaces, Edited by Amy Cicchino and Troy Hicks, WAC Clearinghouse, 2024, pp. 71-92.

Faris, Michael, Michelle Flahive, Elizabeth Hughes, and Callie F. Kostelich. "Piloting a Language Autoethnography in a First-Year Writing Program: A Study of Five Multilingual Student Writers." Open Words: Access and English Studies, vol. 15, no. 1, 2023, pp. 118-42.

Brawley, Lauren, Morgan Connor, Meghalee Das, Aliethia Dean, Claudia Diaz, Michael J. Faris, Michelle Flahive, Maeve Kirk, Max Kirschenbaum, Joshua Kulseth, Alfonsina Lago, Kristina Lewis, Lance Lomax, Brook McClurg, Zachary Ostraff, Anthony Ranieri, Sierra Sinor, Rebekah Smith, and Yifan Zhang. "Incorporating Multimodal Literacies Across a FYW Program: Graduate Instructors' Preparation and Experiences." Professional Multimodal Composition: Faculty and Institutional Perspectives, edited by Santosh Khadka and Shyam B. Pandey, University of Colorado P, 2023, pp. 95-112.

Faris, Michael J. "The Circulation of Embodied Affects in a Revision of a First-Year Writing Program." Our Body of Work, edited by Melissa Nicolas and Anna Sicari, University of Colorado P, 2022, pp. 169-83.

Faris, Michael J., Callie F. Kostelich, Tanner Walsh, Sierra Sinor, Michelle Flahive, and Leah Heilig. "3,000 Podcasts a Year: Teaching and Administering New Media Composition in a First-Year Writing Program." Proceedings of the Annual Computers and Writing Conference, edited by Chen Chen and Lydia Wilkes, The WAC Clearinghouse, 2020.

Selected Conference Presentations/Workshops

Kostelich, Callie F. and Alison Wells. "Our Collaborative Mixtape of Alternate Tracks." The Untenured and/or Alternative-Academic WPA Standing Group Sponsored Panel. Conference on College Composition and Communication, 2025.

Kostelich, Callie F., Michelle Cowen, and Alison Wells. "Innovation at All Stages of Course Design." Association for Business Communication Annual International Conference, 2024.

Kostelich, Callie F., Michael J. Faris, Jacob Weston, and Michelle Cowan. "Incremental Change and Wholesale Reform: Reflecting on and Revising an R1 First-Year Writing Program." Conference on College Composition and Communication, 2024.

Kostelich, Callie F., and Michelle Cowan. "Addressing the Barriers Between Us and That Future: Feminist Activist Coalition Building in Writing Studies." Feminisms and Rhetorics Conference, 2023.

Kostelich, Callie F., Jacob Weston, Josephine Lawson, Sam Littman, and Liz Cozby. "Ethics of Inclusion: Piloting Grading Contracts in FYW at Texas Tech University." Council for Writing Program Administrators, 2023.

Weston, Jacob. "The First-Year Writing Classroom as Affective Place." American Studies Association of Texas Conference, 2022.

Kostelich, Callie F. "Teaching Teachers of Writing: Interrogating the Practices and Places that Serve—or Fail to Serve—Us Well." Conference on College Composition and Communication, 2021.

Kostelich, Callie F., Maeve Kirk, and Sierra Sinor. "Stronger Together: Feminist Teaching and Mentoring in First-Year Writing at Texas Tech." Feminisms and Rhetorics, 2019.