CO150 College Composition

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CO150--College Composition--is a common experience for most CSU students. CO150 focuses on initiating students into academic discourse and developing composing practices that will prepare them for success as university students and as citizens. Therefore, the course focuses on critical reading and inquiry, writing for a variety of rhetorical situations, and enabling effective writing processes.

Its key objectives include the following:

• Developing critical reading practices to support research and writing

• Understanding writing as a rhetorical practice, i.e., choosing effective strategies for addressing purpose, audience and context

• Developing a repertoire of strategies for addressing a variety of specific rhetorical situations, i.e., different purposes, audiences, and contexts

• Learning important elements of academic discourse, such as forming and critically investigating questions, using sources effectively and ethically, and writing effective summaries, analyses, and arguments

• Increasing information literacy through practicing strategies for locating, selecting, and evaluating sources for inquiry

• Developing effective research and revision processes, including collaboration and response, and using feedback to guide revision

This curriculum is also designed to help instructors realize three broader educational goals:

• Engage students as active members of the CSU community

• Engage students as active and interested learners

• Develop student understanding of their positions as world citizens responding to significant global challenges

As we work to meet the CSU Composition Program’s objectives as well as the core curriculum requirements, we rely on the metaphor of writing as a conversation. Like a conversation, writing involves exchanges of ideas that help us shape our own ideas and opinions. Students usually know that they would be foolish to open their mouths the moment they join a group of people engaged in conversation—instead, they’d typically listen for a few moments to understand what’s being discussed. Then, if they found they had something to offer, they would wait until an appropriate moment to contribute. Our students understand what happens to people who make off-topic, insensitive, inappropriate, or otherwise ill-considered remarks in a conversation. In CO150, we build on this understanding by suggesting that, prior to contributing to the debate about an issue, they should read, discuss, and inquire further about what other writers have written. Then, when they’ve gained an understanding of the conversation, they can offer their own contribution to it. By using this metaphor, we can help students build on their understanding of discourse as situated within larger social and cultural contexts.

The course or its equivalent is required by the All-University Core Curriculum to satisfy Category 1 a., Basic Competency in Written Communication. (See http://catalog.colostate.edu/front/aucc.aspx). In addition to meeting this CSU core requirement, CO150 credit will satisfy a core requirement for communication (CO 2) at any Colorado public higher education college or university. This is due to its inclusion in the state's guaranteed transfer (gtPathways) program. (See this PDF.)