VAN NUYS : College’s Writing Center Goes Digital

The second R now stands for ROM at Los Angeles Valley College.

Students who were trained on the three Rs of reading, writing and arithmetic now have computers to bring them up to speed in the Van Nuys community college’s revamped Writing Center.

“We’re trying to make high-tech tutoring available to students,” said Lynn Marshall, a supervising tutor for the Writing Center, which was dedicated Thursday in Humanities Building Room 100.

Two Apple computers are now available to students who visit the center each week for writing help. The free tutorial service tackles problems in spelling, essay writing, grammar and other skills.

Writing Center officials hope the new computers will ease the burden on the program’s 12 tutors, who see more than 250 students each week.

In the old room, Marshall said, the only equipment was a set of dictionaries.

“We figure we’ll program the computers for some sort of quick tutorial service if we have a bunch of students who come in with the same writing problem,” Marshall said. “It would provide basic services that we find ourselves doing repeatedly, and it saves us time.”

The Writing Center, including the computers and tutors’ salaries, is funded by a $200,000 grant from a nonprofit group, the Alliance for the Advancement of Education.

The computers, which were installed Monday, also have CD-ROM drives, scanners and a color printer and soon could offer students access to the so-called information superhighway to improve composition and structure, said Steve Whitney, Writing Center manager.