Write Now: Equipping Christian Leaders to Communicate to Tomorrow

The Southern Association for Colleges Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) is the regional accrediting body for southern, U.S. institutions that award associate, baccalaureate, master’s, and doctoral degrees. Every 10 years, Regent University’s accreditation must be reaffirmed by SACSCOC. One element of this process is the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP), which emphasizes improving the quality of student learning.

Accreditation helps determine if an institution meets or exceeds minimum standards of quality. This, in turn, helps students determine acceptable institutions for enrollment. And employers often require evidence that applicants have received a degree from an accredited school or program.

The QEP helps the institution engage in the continuous assessment and improvement of student learning. Numerous areas of the university collaborate to bring out the best in its students and provide meaningful opportunities to grow.

Regent’s area of focus is on improving foundational writing skills. Write Now is the name of our QEP initiative. Its intent is to empower each of our students with stronger foundational writing skills – from grammar, mechanics and formatting to organization, voice, and thesis development.

By the end of their first year in the program, students will be able to:

• Articulate a clear thesis or organizing principle.
• Demonstrate critical thinking skills through a logical presentation of adequate supporting information.
• Use formatting that follows a correct style and successfully avoids plagiarism.
• Use an effective voice and style that is appropriate for the audience, topic, and purpose.
• Demonstrate mechanics mostly free of errors in the conventions of the English language.

The key players in supporting and assessing Write Now progress include: each school and faculty member, under the direction of the dean; University Writing Lab; Information Technology (IT) Department; University Libraries; and an Academic Affairs’ Writing Committee.

Learn more about Roles & Responsibilities

1. Each school or program will, under the direction of the dean:
   1. Develop and circulate rubrics and best practices for good writing within its discipline appropriate to degree level
   2. Ensure that these pieces are effectively communicated to both faculty and students
   3. Engage in a norming process to ensure faculty consistency in the approach to writing and its grading
   4. Encourage faculty to provide incentives for students to use resources of the University Writing Lab (UWL) and University Libraries
   5. Train faculty to use Advise alerts in writing-intensive courses
2. CAS and the UWL will facilitate the training of all Regent faculty on best practices for writing teaching by:
   1. Offering targeted professional development options that all faculty must complete
   2. Providing additional and regularly updated online resources (videos, writing tips, etc.) on best practices for writing and writing instruction
   3. Disseminating information about UWL and University Library resources

3. The UWL will provide enhanced resources and services to students and faculty by:
   1. Increasing the availability of tutoring appointments
   2. Coordinating with Media Services to provide more video resources available to students
   3. Designating a UWL representative to serve as a liaison with faculty to further communication and collaboration
   4. Taking specific steps to increase awareness of UWL resources
   5. Deans will decide if their school will make tutoring services optional, encouraged, or incentivized.
4. IT will:
   1. Provide Grammarly for use by the whole Regent community
   2. Make an annual determination of the best available writing assistance technology
5. The University Libraries will:
   1. Develop resources directing faculty and staff to materials relevant to good writing and writing instruction
   2. Increase program awareness through marketing and publicity of library resources and events
   3. Integrate current programs such as Jump Start and Write In into the QEP
   4. Deans will decide if their school will make these programs optional, encouraged, or incentivized
6. Academic Affairs will create a university writing-focused committee to:
   1. Implement the above plan.
   2. Based on implementation and assessment of these strategies, recommend other program modifications

Review UNIV 100, 101, 102, and 500, and associated faculty professional development offerings to ensure quality and alignment of writing expectations and training with University-wide best practices

The QEP began in 2016 when the QEP Committee met to select a QEP topic. In Summer 2018 the committee passed the “baton” to the QEP Implementation Committee (QEPIC). SACSCOC will conduct a site visit to Regent on February 26 -28, 2019 as part of the university’s assessment.

Explore QEP Implementation Schedule – Same question on displaying

QEP Implementation Schedule

The QEP Implementation Schedule records when the action items will be implemented from Year 0 (2018–2019) to Year 1 (2019–2020) of the QEP.

QEP Summary topics include:
How does the QEP impact faculty?
How does the QEP impact students?
Other areas involved in the QEP
How does the QEP impact CAS and the graduate schools?
Assessment Task Chart, and more.

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