Epistemologist: Writing across the curriculum, I suggest.

Skeptic: Since you are suggesting, what approach are you suggesting?

Epistemologist: The Socratic method.

Skeptic: Socrates died too long ago to have developed a method worthy of our use.

Epistemologist: Is 399 B.C. (or B.C.E.) eons ago in the history of knowledge and learning? No, in fact, the approaches employed back then have become timeless and have been used over the course of centuries.

Skeptic: At any rate, what is his method as identified by his best pupil Plato?

Epistemologist: For example, in Plato's Republic, his method is the search for truth by two or more individuals who subject questions or topics to rational or logical analysis.

Skeptic: For whom are we searching for truth this fine day?

Epistemologist: For students, for professors, and maybe even for administrators at Surry Community College.

Skeptic: But for what truth does Plato have Socrates search in The Republic?

Epistemologist: How society might best be run!

Skeptic: Ah! Whether right or wrong, philosophers, without gender or racial bias of course, apply their wisdom, its basis in reason, to settle disputes and controversies. Shall I be a philosopher-king, and you, a philosopher-queen? (Skeptic laughs.)

Epistemologist: Of course, or anyway we should be logicians and should be wise, and we should remember that impiety was one of the charges on which Socrates was condemned.

Skeptic: No impiety out of my mouth or from my pen either.

Epistemologist: The other charge was corrupting the youth of Athens.

Skeptic: Whether Socrates was guilty or not of corrupting youth, I presume that one of our goals should be the opposite of corrupting.

Epistemologist: Although there are many ways to divert youth from corruption, as professors, we concern ourselves with students' acquisition of knowledge and a tremendous part of that knowledge comes from students actually writing. Although many students are not consciously aware that they use the Socratic method of debating issues mentally or verbally, it is the way in which they find their own rationale for their personal vision of the world.

Clearly, we corrupt our youth by not preparing them effectively for the expectation of writing abilities when they transfer to four-year universities. Bottom line is if students can't write when they transfer, they flunk out. It is plain and simple. If they move into the professional world, the inability to write may prevent advancement and certainly will have a negative influence on the way in which they are perceived by their peers and supervisors.

Skeptic: Impious me! With class size relatively large at Surry Community College and a tremendous amount of content area to cover, is incorporating writing across the disciplines a truly valuable tool that produces learning?

Epistemologist: Yes! The act of writing causes the student to reflect upon the subject matter from a number of perspectives. The student experiences different ways of understanding, seeing, and finally learning.

Skeptic: Are you saying that writing is more valuable than other strategies of teaching and/or learning?

The work of many researchers indicates that "higher order thinking skills such as analysis and synthesis seem dependent on written language" (Couch 195).

Skeptic: How might professors consider incorporating writing that won't take away from content instruction?

Epistemologist: There are many ways to incorporate writing in every discipline, including lab notes in the areas of science, reports, journals, general responses, solutions to problems in math, proposals, interviews, rebuttals, etc.

The act of writing does not need to involve immense length either. Writing in any form involves simply considering a given topic and thinking through the topic on paper. But what the mind is forced to do is to consider the topic and in a sense come to know it.

In addition, writing across the curriculum does not need to involve strict adherence to the rules of writing in all cases.

Skeptic: Aren't you suggesting a corrupting of our youth? For example, aren't you saying to ignore grammatical errors?

Epistemologist: What I am saying is that the act of writing in and of itself creates activity in the mind, an infusion of thought that will contribute to the formation of knowledge.

For some purposes, adherence to the rules of writing - clarity, precision, and logic - is critical, but for other purposes, exploration is what is needed, and in such cases strict adherence to the standardized rules of writing is not as important as the content or the knowledge obtained by the exploratory activity.

However, following the rules of writing is essential if the act of writing involves producing a written product that will be used to determine a student's knowledge of subject matter and will be turned in for a grade. Grammar as part of the editing segment in the process allows for writing to be clearer and ideas to be conveyed more effectively. If the writing assignment requires the student to turn in a finished product, then clearly following the rules of writing is essential for the best written communication to take place.

Many students are weak in this area and will benefit tremendously from writing more, and the more they write, there is greater opportunity for students to acquire these basic skills.

As an instructor who has worked in the world of business as well as academics, I am convinced that the ability to communicate well through writing will influence a student's success in college as well as his or her success in the professional world.

Writing is the basis for academic success as well as professional. It also provides exploration into the ways in which subjects connect to other subjects. These connections contribute to the way we all construct our vision of the world.

Skeptic: Indeed! The unknowable truths seem closer to being knowable. The mind begins "plunging and spreading itself...to produce innumerable forms" (Montaigne). Clearly, people obtain knowledge in a variety of ways, and through writing we learn more about ourselves and our world, ultimately contributing to our rational shaping of our world.