Robert Gomes

Gomes 1

Professor Admiraal
17 November 2016
English 1001

College Writing Vs. High School Writing

According to recent data acquired by College Atlas, 30 % of college and
university students drop out of college their first year(Beckstead 1). This raises
questions like are recent high school graduates ready for college writing skills? Many of
the recent college graduates think they are ready but have no idea what they are getting
themselves into. These high school graduates are not ready for the long nights of college
writing assignments given to the typical college student. To be a successful college writer,
a student must understand the multiple genres of college writing, the differences between
college and high school writing, and some easy mistakes that can be made during the
college writing process
Ever wondered the rage of technolohy students us well im the article
Revisualizing Composition the authors discuss a study that explains how students use a
range of technology uses for composing their tasks given to them by professors. I would
agree that the article matches my experiences as a student of the way we go about writing
in college. The article states that students have been reporting uses of older technology
when preforming tasks given by professors. Older technology is referred to as Notebooks,
pen, paper and tools students are used to using. New technology is like Ebooks and other
tools that students are not familiar with using. One of the statements I agree with most in
this article is that as we report above, students continue to use notebook or paper,
pencils, and word-processing programs for writing academic papers, research papers,
lecture notes, reading notes, and outlines, and most of the students uses of these

technology's focus on fulfilling school assignments(Moore 8).

When typing in the classes that I have taken so far I, have accommodated myself
to using the same old technologies that the article describes. I use these old technoloies
because they make me feel more comfortable because I have been so familiar to them. In
my current classes I am taking as a college student we perform task such as writing
papers, composing outlines, taking notes, and writing down general ideas. These can be
very difficult writings for some students so knowing how to use the tools to help preform
these activities causes less stress on the writer. Using these old technoloies the article
describes makes it so much easier to complete these tasks given by my professors
because I dont have to constantly worry about how to work a new program. The old
technologies that are commonly used are notebooks used for almost any writing
assignment. Students are more comfortable using notebooks because they have been
using this tool a long time and are used to using it. Also an nice old technology that is
commonly used is Microsoft word. Students have been using this for a wide rang of
subjects in school for as long as its been created.
One observation that can be made about college writing is the harsh criticism and
the intensive workload that college writing brings along. In college your work has to be
down right perfect with no spelling errors and proper formatting. Whereas in High School
the teachers were more worried if you were going to complete the work or not. Also what
comes with college writing is the work load. As I have experienced all outlines that I
have typed have been very detailed and lengthy due to the high standards held by my
Political Science and Pre-law professors. This is a good thing because it helps my writing
every day and gives me more knowledge on the use and placement of words. College
writing has been a good thing because it has helped me widen my vocabulary and has
substantially helped me as a writer by the harsh criticism that comes with it.
Ever wondered if recent high school graduates are ready for college a observation
made by an article named Are Our Graduates College-Writing Ready? It discusses how

recent High School graduates are not so ready for college level writing. The article
addresses that high school students need more preparation in critical-thinking skills
essential to writing college level papers ( Hortwitz 1). Most high school students need
more practice to develop these critical thinking skills so they can advance in the college
writing standards. Another fact that was interesting in this article was that Teachers of
the students who graduated from American high schools in the spring may think that their
charges are well prepared for the colleges they are entering this fall, but the professors
who will greet them on campus disagree (Hortwitz 1). Even though high school teachers
feel confident in their graduates they shouldn't feel confident because there are still a lot
of skills these graduates need to obtain. For example in the article it states A high school
student assigned to do a research paper might turn in a paper that is a series of summaries
of the sources he found. In college, he would be expected to articulate a thesis, assess
competing arguments, and make his own conclusions (Horowitz 1).
Hortwitz is surely right about high school graduates not being ready for college
level writing because of the extra techniques of writing they still need to acquire. The
writing that was required for Lasalle High School which I attended was two research
papers in English on topics that we ourselves got to choose. In other classes like science,
mathematics, and history we were given fill in the blanks and questions to answer on a
piece of paper. This would help me to agree with Hortwitz on the graduates not being
ready for college level writing because high schools aren't giving more challenging
writing that they should be giving. In some of my college classes it was an easy
adjustment to the writing expected from the professors, if I did have some difficulties I
would acknowledge them and work on them. When my college career started I did not
feel fully prepared for what I was getting myself into. One obstacle I ran into was writing
eight page outlines every two days for a class. One way I got over that obstacle is getting
into a routine and sticking to it so I got used to writing long outlines. I have learned that I
am willing to face any obstacle college writing throws at me and try to accomplish it with

the best of my abilities.

Because writing at the college level can be a very challenging thing for high
school graduates to do there is some advice that one can follow. With all the requirements
such as developing a strong thesis to perfectly citing the sources high school graduates
use in a research paper. This can put recent high school graduates just entering college in
a rough spot. The kind of writing these recent graduates should look out for is outlines on
a book they recently reviewed to a outline on how they are going to structure a paper.
High school graduates should also look out for taking notes during lectures and also the
long exam study guides they will receive throughout their college writing career. Some of
the not so difficult writing includes summaries on text that you read, book reviews, and
reflections on previous papers that you have turned in. This should not scare the recent
high school graduates but help them prepare for what college writing could throw at
them.
In college writing there is a lot of mistakes that you should look out for before
turning in a assignment. One example when writing a research paper make sure yo cite
your sources and cite them properly. This mistake can be easily masterd and can cost you
because if you dont cite a source you can get punished for plagiarism which colleges do
not take lightly. One way you can prevent this issue from ever occurring is to paraphrase,
cite, use quotes, and cite the quotes you use to avoid plagiarizing someone else's work
that you have used. Another common mistake that college writers can make is making
grammatical mistakes. These mistakes happen to most students but this mistake can be
easily preventable. One easy way to prevent making grammatical mistakes is reading
your paper out loud and seeing if any of the words dont sou right or if any words are
misspelled.
In conclusion there are a lot of pitfalls that college writing has to offer. One pitfall
could be that you might spend long nights working on writing assignments given by
professors. This could be a bad thing to recent high school graduates but they should look

at it as them strengthening their writing skills and their vocabulary. Some advice that
would be given from a current college student to a high school graduate is to pay
attention to what you professors write about the flaws of the assignment you turn in. If
you work on those flaws this will help you best achieve the goal of passing the class and
help strengthen your writing. Also college students would advise the recent high school
graduates to attend every class and actually engage in the conversations that are take
place. This will help you because you will go to every lecture and will not miss any
important information given about test, papers, assignments, or when you do or dont
have to come to class.
To be a successful college writer, a student must understand the multiple genres of
college writing, the differences of college and high school writing, and some easy
mistakes and advice that is listed during the college writing process. High schoolers are
nowhere close to being ready for the college writing assignments they are about to
acquire. High school students need more criticism and a heavier work load so they can be
prepared for what college writing has to throw at them. One way this could happen is if
the high school teachers make the students focus more on writing a properly constructed
paper rather than the worrying about the student just having it finished. This would
greatly increase the chances of high school students succeeding in their college writing
career.

Work Cited
" College Dropout Statistics 26 Results." College Dropout Statistics
AgoSearch. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Nov. 2016.
Hortwitz, Steven. Education Week. Issue 2. Vol.27. Page 27. 9/5/2007.
Moore, Jessie L., et al. Revisualizing Composition: How First-Year Writers Use
Composing
Technologies. Computers and Composition, vol. 39, 2016, pp. 1-13.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compcom2015.11.001.