The Center for Writing Studies (CWS) was founded in 1990 as an interdisciplinary academic unit in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Aligned with the addition of Advanced Composition to the General Education requirements and under the leadership of the founding director, Professor Gail Hawisher, CWS was charged with three, linked missions:
1) to develop a Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) Program to support faculty and TAs across the campus in using and teaching writing in their disciplines,
2) to expand individual support to all writers on campus through the creation of a new writing center, the Writers Workshop, and
3) to coordinate a cross-disciplinary graduate specialization and to sustain a community of scholars in the emerging field of Writing Studies.
Faculty and graduate students from departments across the campus come together in CWS to attend workshops and courses, discuss teaching, share their scholarship, and participate in colloquia, symposia, professional development, and research projects.