City college writing courses

[karenk]

I already have a BA and want to take writing classes. I'm going to take one through a university's extended education program. I was thinking of taking one at a city college also since it's cheap. Problem is many years ago I enrolled in a city college writing course and the class consisted of the instructor saying "write." Yea it was that bad. No discussion, assignments, just give her anything you write and she would write critique statements at the end. Of course I dropped the class. Was this unique or should I expect another teacher that is just putting in time to get paid? I don't want to repeat the experience.

 

[Jae Rae]

You live in the East Bay. Have you thought of SF State, which has a great writing program? A friend just started the graduate program in Creative Writing.

Another friend is taking an online screenwriting class through UCLA. She gets lots of feedback from her teacher and classmates via weekly discussions.

Merritt College has some excellent programs, e.g., Horticulture, but I don't know about writing. Have you tried RateMyProfessors.com

 

[redacted]

The peralta colleges are cheap, but unfortunately, you run into the problem of not being challenged.

You know, you can always sit in on UC Berkeley classes....

UC Berkeley Online Schedule of Classes

People here are at least fairly educated on average, although there are still plenty of idiots.

Another thing: anyone can sign up for UCB classes during summer sessions. So if you want to wait until then, it's probably your best option, at least in the East Bay.

 

[edcoaching]

It all depends. I have some writer friends who teach at community colleges and do excellent work. In our town a couple of the cc's have much higher-level students than others. If you can find anyone who's had specific instructors it's really the only way of knowing.

That said, I learned way more at writing conferences. There are lots of them around and they can becheap compared to college courses.

 

[Glycerine]

I think it really depends on the teacher. I go to a community college and my writing instructor is fairly tough. For me, I had to write like 5 or 6 drafts for my research paper to get an 94 on it. She doesn't give out A's easily.

 

[Mole]

I attended a creative writing course at College.

Our teacher was well motivated and ran a good course.

However I came to the conclusion that creative writing can't be taught this way.

I do think though that creative writing can be practised by writing every day.

However to write every day for years and decades requires an inner need to write. And it doesn't seem to me such a need can be taught.

So why have creative writing courses sprung up all over the literate world? Why does everyone and their dog want to be a creative writer?

Creative writing has now become visible where before it was mysterious.

Creative writing has become visible because our environment has changed, making creative writing no longer mysterious but visible to everyone and their dog.

Fish didn't discover water, so in a literate environment, creative literacy remains invisible as water.

However the moment fish became amphibian and were able to move from their environment of water to the environment of air and back, they discovered water for the first time.

And in the same way, just as we are becoming amphibious and moving from the environment of literacy to the environment of the electronic media, called the Noosphere, we discover creative literacy.

As we move into the Noosphere, creative literacy becomes visible for the first time.

And naturally everyone and their dog want to write creatively.

Bless our cotton socks.