Area 3 Writing Project Blog

Since the creation of the Bay Area Writing Project (BAWP) at UC Berkeley in 1974, the writing project model for staff development in the teaching of writing has been replicated statewide and nationwide. The Area 3 Writing Project (A3WP) at UC Davis is one of the 17 projects in the California Writing Project network and one of 170 in the National Writing Project network. Established in 1981, A3WP is a professional development network for California teachers and administrators that follows the writing project teachers-teaching-teachers model, with all programs and activities based upon the following principles:

• Student writing can be improved by improving the teaching of writing, and the best teacher of other teachers is a successful classroom teacher.
•  Programs designed to improve the teaching of writing must involve teachers of all grade levels and should be collaboratively planned by schools and universities.
• Large-scale educational change occurs only over time and can best be accomplished by those who work within the schools. # What is known about the teaching of writing comes from research and from the successful practices of those who teach writing.
• Because writing is fundamental to critical thinking and learning in all subject areas, all writing project programs should involve teachers from across the disciplines. # Teachers of writing must also write, for only by writing can teachers fully understand what they are asking of their students

In addition to the writing project’s core Invitational Leadership Program, A3WP conducts demonstration workshop series, hosts intensive one- and two-week summer open programs, designs and conducts staff development inservice programs, collaborates on extended partnerships with schools and districts, and offers research opportunities for teachers and administrators throughout our thirteen-county region, which extends from the inland reaches of the Sacramento River Delta, throughout the Sacramento Valley, and up to the Sierra foothills and the greater Lake Tahoe region