Written by: Nathan M.
You might have noticed that in the last month, we’ve started advertising a new weekly online event called the Write-on-Site. We’ve been meeting on Thursdays every week from 3-5pm on Zoom. If you’ve considered attending but maybe feel a little intimidated or unsure about it, then this blog post is for you!
So what is the Write-on-Site? Well, it’s a space—currently a digital space—where graduate writers at IUPUI can come together and get some writing done. It’s is an opportunity to build community and recreate some of the incidental socializing that’s missing from a socially-distanced graduate experience. Everyone is working on different things—for example, at the last Write-on-Site, we had people working on forum posts, a final paper for an anthropology class, and a business plan. When we share this space, other graduate writers can provide a supportive community environment and a designated time for writing projects to happen.
We usually begin the event with a brief, casual conversation about where we’re at in our respective projects and talk through any struggles we might be having. For example, for our first Write-on-Site this semester we talked about setting reasonable expectations for ourselves. Specifically, we discussed how understanding our individual writing processes can help us to set better and more achievable goals. We also talked about strategies for staying motivated, particularly with longer writing projects. After everyone’s concerns had been addressed and we had supported and motivated each other, we then each dove into our writing.
After we start writing, there are generally long periods of total silence interrupted occasionally by someone asking a question or a new person joining in—some people come as soon as the event starts and stay for the whole two hours, while others just drop by when they can to get some writing done. Even in the long, quiet moments when everyone is concentrating on their own work, there’s a palpable feeling of connection and communal motivation. Though we are all working on our individual projects, we are all writing together in the same space, making progress and making community.
We have two more meetings scheduled this semester, for December 3rd and December 10th, and we will continue with Write-on-Sites and other graduate programming in the spring. If this sounds like an event that would be helpful to you, I hope to see you there! If you have any questions about the write-on-site, please direct them to us at uwc@iu.edu.
If you would like to join us for our December 3rd Write-on-Site event from 3 to 5pm, you can follow this Zoom link: https://iu.zoom.us/j/5417543236!
