Page 181 - Composition in Convergence The Impact of the New Media on Writing Assessment

148 CHAPTER 6

Companies like WebCT, BlackBoard, SCT, ETS, Nuventive, and oth-
ers recognize this point. As Batson (2002) reported, these technology
vendors have or are preparing e-portfolio tools to work with their
programs (p. 15). Individual instructors and program directors like
Fred Kemp (2002) realize this point, too, because Kemp's TOPIC/ICON
software represents a different method for students and instructors to
approach networked writing and assessment. However, there need to
be many more choices available for faculty. Not every instructor
wants to be saddled with "course-in-a-box" software that limits her
instructional options. Many will find that the ETS Criterion software
merely replicates the usual holistic scoring approach to papers that
ETS has done for decades, even though Criterion offers checklists and
feedback to writers as well as stores the data in "portfolio" form. Nor
does every program have the need or the bandwidth available to bor-
row or adapt an intensive system like TOPIC/ICON. Developing full
access to both technologies means the field of Composition Studies
should have a range of database choices so instructors and programs
can select what works best for their needs. Full access does not mean
depending on one vendor because that's what the university pur-
chased, nor does it mean individual instructors have to reinvent large
databases to fit smaller programmatic needs.
In writing about cross-curricular design portfolios, Jeffrey D.
Wilhelm wrote, "You don't create, define, or find meaning for your-
self by doing someone else's work; you do it by creating and con-
structing meanings in actual situations that are of great personal
relevance and social significance" (2000, p. 15). Wilhelm's observa-
tion should also extend to how Composition encourages access to
technology before instructors assess student e-texts. Writing in-
structors and their programs must decide which learning situations
have great personal relevance and social significance for melding
these two technologies. That said, there are places within academic
work loads and departmental requirements where faculties can be-
gin exploring those actual situations that bear on personal relevance
and social significance to increase technological access.
Perhaps one of the simplest ways to encourage the growth of
tandem technologies is for tenure and promotion committees to
consider the creation of software that offers assessment for e-texts
as being akin to other scholarly activity. The fight for publication is
fierce for junior faculty members; there are too few scholarly jour-
nals and presses for all the younger scholars producing papers and