The End of Composition

For me, the "end of composition" is producing students who can articulate their thoughts clearly and logically on paper while adhering to basics rules regarding grammar, style, and organization. They should also be able to analyze and, to some extent, use sources, which is the basic requirement for almost all college assignments. Freshman come into composition 1301 not knowing how to write in a way that shows they are articulate and intelligent, which they clearly are at least verbally because they were accepted to Texas Tech. Starting with the summary exercise, classroom instructors and document instructors work towards teaching skills that build upon each other and ideally lead to the student feeling confident enough in his/her skills to be able to produce research based papers in composition 1302. Teaching these kinds of generalized skills is also an "end of composition;" skills like being able to summarize and paraphrase can be applied to absolutely any discipline or occupation that the student chooses to pursue after composition class ends - even, heaven forbid, if the student decides to drop out of college on December 11th, he/she can apply those skills to secretarial work or whatever other occupation he/she chooses.