I have never experienced an English class like this one. In all my former classes, I was handed an assignment that told me what to write about. In this class, I picked a topic that reflected my interests. I learned to take chances, and if something did not work at first, keep making revisions. I challenge the next class to take advantage of this course. If you do, you will find writing enjoyable and easy. You will not dread a second draft or worry about receiving a bad grade. If you work hard, you will find that improvement is rather easy. Write several drafts, be serious during the peer revision sessions, and go to office hours. Lastly, I leave behind my Richard Sherman project to show that authorship is not just a part of writing. It is a part of life. Every action and word adds to your story.

–Brendan

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Dear Ms. Barta’s Second Semester Class,

This course has proven extremely beneficial to me and significantly improved my writing capabilities. As a freshman, it truly builds a strong foundation for the rest of the writing we will do throughout college by helping to teach us to think about the given topics in new, complex ways. The concepts we cover set the precedent for making both concrete and abstract connections when forming arguments and authoring our written works. Do not worry if the material seems complicated and frustrating at times, as the purpose of reading works from authors like Barthes and Foucault is to make us think from new perspectives about difficult concepts. Personally, I feel that the topics we explored genuinely helped me establish a sense of identity as a writer, and taught me to think of “author” as an action before a person. I now realize that throughout our lives, everything we do is part of the process of authoring our authentic selves, and in this class each assignment will help build upon that concept. It will be a challenging, but very rewarding experience. Best of luck next semester!

Sincerely,

Matthew Cahill

P.S. Try to beat my selfies and tweets on the social media accounts. I dare you. 

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My experience in other English classes has never been quite like this one. I have never noticed a progression of topics and related themes, typically because there never existed a smooth flow between units. This class stood apart from my past English classes because everything we did related back to the class’s major question: “what is an author?” We built upon many aspects and skills to answer this question. This class is like a narrative in that every assignment we did was a continuation of the previous topic, much like different chapters in a book. We grew together as a class, constantly learning new things from one another. Our essays showed us different perspectives and skills, while the social medias gave us insight into our different personalities. At the end of the semester, our narrative is complete. It is much like a first draft since we were Ms. Barta’s guinea pigs. It is up to the next class to build upon our narrative and better it. The first draft contains all the elements, but the sequential drafts will continue to be better as they build upon the good and change what did not work well. Each draft will come closer to answering the question of what an author is. Like with each paper we write, there is always room for improvement. A narrative does not stop. It grows and flourishes, but it will still contain elements from the past. As the first class, we leave our first draft to you. It is your job to find your voice and create the second draft.

– Lora

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Coming into freshman writing seminar, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I was glad I was able to switch out of literature and into a writing class, because I prefer writing to reading. Nevertheless, writing is not my forte and I had no expectations for the course. I believe I grew as a writer over the course of the semester. I learned how to be more concrete and concise in my writing. I found it surprisingly interesting to investigate what it really means to be an author of a piece of work. I also found it intriguing to understand the distribution of power between the author and audience. I challenge the incoming class to stretch their minds and toy with the different interpretations of being an author and different balances of power between author and audience. 

–Courtney

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I am not sure what you expect from a writing class, I am not even sure what I expected coming in. But enter this class with an open mind. Be honest with your opinions in class. Do not try to pacify the teacher with a class full of yes men. We learned more from our discussions when there was a dissenting opinion. You are an individual with an individual authentic self, so let that show in class and it will make the class very enjoyable. I never thought I would be excited about a paper or sad I slept through a class, but it happened somehow. Some of the readings might not be very enjoyable; in fact they can look like gibberish at first glance. (Beware Barthes! Fear Foucault!) But wait until discussing them in class before giving up. You might surprise yourself when you understand them more as the year goes on. I do not know for sure, but I hope we have left big shoes to fill. So I challenge you to fill them and leave bigger shoes for the next class. But at the very least, be engaged. This class wouldn’t have been half as effective if we didn’t become friends too. Make friends with your class, build a community, and you will want to be engaged and participating. If you can make it fun because of whom else is there, the improvement in your writing will come easier than you’d think and you just might end up enjoying yourself in the process.

–Dave

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Honestly, this course surprised me. I never expected I would be writing with such enthusiasm and thinking so deeply about literature by the end of the semester. It has been years since I actually enjoyed writing papers and attending English class. In the past few months, I have become a substantially better writer and my mind has been opened to a new world of thinking in literature. My advice to next semester’s class is to challenge everything. Nothing in literature is untouchable. We questioned whether an author really could influence a text. Something that I thought, at first, was foolish to even think about. There are a few class discussions where I wish I spoke my mind, because I feel now that I could have contributed with interesting points and perspectives. For example, when discussing authorship the day after reading Barthes’s The Death of the Author, I considered in my head if I should raise my hand and play devil’s advocate on the side of Barthes. But I chose not to because at the time I did not think what I had to say was true (now I do). If I did, it could have brought about an interesting class debate. Finally, enjoy this class. It is probably one of the few classes where you get to choose what you write about. Write about topics that interest you and that you do not mind spending time working on. I know that my academic essay on Batman was so much easier to spend hours working on because I found it so interesting. Not to mention it gave me an excuse to watch The Dark Knight again, one of my favorite movies. Do not take this class for granted and do not just go through the motions to get an A. Enjoy the course, but even after all that, if you really just do not like writing, consider the fact that at least it’s not calculus.

–Kevin

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To the class that follows my First Year Writing Seminar I challenge you to engage yourself in each class. At times this was a lot to ask of us, especially at 9am on a Tuesday morning. But never the less, most enjoyable classes came from the discussion, questions, and differing viewpoints of the class. I also expect you all to take advantage of the example essays we have provided you, but push the limits of the assignment. We were both lucky and unlucky to not have a template to follow for a few assignments. Although it was frustrating not knowing exactly what the assignment wanted, it allowed us to take the assignment in fun different directions. Two things I will take with me from my experiences in this class are the importance of revising and the helpfulness of office hours. The two can go hand and hand; they both push you as a writer and the assignment to be better.

–Gabrielle

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 The focus on authorship this class presented allowed for a very different view on writing than I had previously encountered.  While in High School we would discuss the author and his life when discussing a work, the focus was never on the idea of authoring an authentic self. The question this class raised daily was “How does one author an authentic self?” This question drove me as I began to write and revise the assignments throughout the semester. With every paragraph and paper I wrote, I asked myself if the paper was illustrating my authentic self, the person I truly was and who I wanted people to know. At first, this question was difficult to answer, as I was used to writing to the teacher in High School. Once I began to step back and look at the work as my own and not my teacher’s, the projects got easier and more enjoyable. I was able to write on topics I actually enjoyed, leading me to write a research paper on the philosophy of True Detective and a video essay on the life of Eminem. The journey of the class was one that I needed to take as a writer, and one that undoubtedly made me a better author of my authentic self.

–Nick

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To the next class: Hi, all I can say is good luck. This class is terrible, she doesn’t let you choose your topic for the research paper, she doesn’t let you use the first person, and she doesn’t let you oppose Barthes. Hah, just kidding. This class was fun. I loved that for the first time writing became personal. We were able to truly explore the audience-author relationship and learn a lot of great writing skills in the process. I will remember arguments we had about Barthes and Foucault and the process of not accepting but at least listening to the ideas of those we do not necessarily agree with. I challenge the next class to continue the conversation and expand on where we left off. We were the guinea pig class; at least you guys have examples from us to work off of. You’re welcome. You may not know it yet, but you are all already authors, not just from your essays turned in to teachers. I hope you guys have as much fun with the class and enjoy learning about the various forms of authorship as I did. Once again, good luck!

–Rachel

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For my final say I would like to start by saying how much this class has improved my idea of writing.  In high school I despised writing and would not give it any credit as to how important and interesting it can be. With this class and with my professor I was able to find the interesting side of writing and see where the fun in writing comes from.  With this idea of writing in my head being changed, I was able to start writing with a little more confidence and try to write things that were interesting to me.  Through the enjoyment of writing about what I like, I was able to improve a little bit as a writer.  I still have a long way to go and need to improve in so many different ways but the main thing I got away from this class was the drive and confidence to improve my wringing skills.  Now moving forward, I expect myself to be able to improve drastically from repetition of writing over and over again.  I want to find within myself the ability to put in the work to write many drafts before submitting my final paper.  This class has showed me the enjoyment of doing this.  This class has proved to me that the hard work will pay off.  I want to leave behind the old me as a writing student and let everyone see and use him as an example and see that anyone can find writing interesting, even the athlete who never wanted to write anything and would have to physically and mentally force himself to begin a paper.

– Tyler

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It’s difficult to think about that a whole semester, but this semester I learned how to be more concise with my writing. I remember that this was the first class I ever attended as a student here at BC. To be honest, I was scared. The class is small, no bigger than fifteen kids, which means you probably will get to know them…really well. Most of my other classes were large, which meant I would not know the kids in them, or have time to meet them all. In this class, I got to know every single person, which is something I cannot say about my other classes. I’ve connected more with those in this class more than students in my other classes. Overall, our whole class is pretty great. So, to our future replacements, my advice to you is don’t suck. Try to meet the kids in your class. Try to say hi to them in the hallways when you see them. Try to write to the best of your ability. The little exercises you do for homework, they ALL have a purpose so make sure you work hard on those too. From this class I not only took away friendships, but also writing skills that will help me throughout my college career.

–Vanessa

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Before this semester started and I registered for First Year Writing Seminar, I instantly thought that it was going to be a bunch of insignificant essays and every class session will be long and boring. However, none of that was true. I must say that this course was one of my favorite classes that I have taken this semester because I have actually enjoyed learning the material that was assigned to me. Ms. Barta was a great teacher who had a pretty interesting twist on the way we had to do the assignments. Moreover, one thing that I would have loved is if our class was a bit more enthusiastic during class sessions, but I just think that was simply because we had the class at nine o’clock. For the future classes that have Ms. Barta as a professor, try to do these three things: think outside the box, do all of the assignments because it helps you understand the upcoming ones more and value feedback; it is essential to becoming a better writer. One important factor that I learned throughout this course is the value of authorship and the huge role that it plays in author’s works. In the process of me learning about authorship, I have learned to be a better writer. In closing, the amount of effort and work that you put into this class is going to determine how well you do and how much you learn. Be original, open minded and most importantly enjoy every second of the class- it will be over before you know it.

–Avionne

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The class may be over, but the conversation never really ends. If you were at one of the later orientations, you probably heard Fr. Himes talk about universities as the vehicles for great conversation. Conversation in this context does not mean a talk between a few people. It’s more like a millennia-old journey towards truth. In my opinion, learning how to write is the first step towards joining these millennia-old discussions. Writing is so much more than jotting down words on a page. It’s the transmission of ideas and humanity’s greatest method of transcending time. A good writer can join a conversation with Augustine on love, with Marx on the plight of the worker, or with Alexander Hamilton on federalism. Ideas such as these are so grand that conversations about them continue even after the original debaters have passed. To the students taking our place next semester: remember to never take for granted the institution you’ve become a part of. Boston College is more than the four years before a job. It’s a microcosm of all human thought. And Freshman Writing Seminar is a great first step into conversations so much larger than yourself.

–John