A while ago, the WAC Clearinghouse, a partner of the International Literacy Management initiative, announced three new or re-published books that are closely related to literacy management issues. All of the books below are available for free download in PDF format and soon also in ePub format at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/

Book 1: The edited collection, Writing Programs Worldwide: Profiles of Academic Writing in Many Places, is available on the Clearinghouse at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/wpww and at Parlor Press at http://www.parlorpress.com/wpww/ (for those of you who would like to purchase a print copy). The collection (first published in 2012) is edited by Chris Thaiss, Gerd Bräuer, Paula Carlino, Lisa Ganobcsik-Williams, and Aparna Sinha. Emerging from the International WAC/WID Mapping Project, this collection of essays is meant to inform decision-making by teachers, program managers, and college/university administrators considering how writing can most appropriately be defined, managed, funded, and taught in the places where they work. Writing Programs Worldwide offers an important global perspective to the growing research literature in the shaping of writing programs.

Book 2: The High School Writing Center: Establishing and Maintaining One, edited by Pamela B. Farrell (Childers) is now available at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/hswc/ courtesy of the partnership between WAC Clearinghouse and NCTE. This collection, which is part of the Landmark Publications series, offers twenty-two articles that provide practical information on establishing a writing center and monitoring its daily operation. The collection addresses the issue of establishing and maintaining a successful high school writing lab/center. Since its first appearance in 1989 in print, this book has served hundreds of high schools around the Globe as a compass for setting up writing centers in institutions of secondary education.

Book 3: Roots in the Sawdust: Writing to Learn Across the Disciplines, edited by Anne Ruggles Gere in 1985, is available at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/sawdust/ courtesy of the partnership between WAC Clearinghouse and NCTE.. This book is also part of the Landmark Publications series. It offers  a response to Arthur N. Applebee’s call for “more situations in which writing can serve as a tool for learning rather than as a means to display acquired knowledge” (1982). Gere brings together teacher-authors from a wide variety of disciplines to detail how they have successfully used writing activities to improve their students’ comprehension–without creating significant grading burdens for themselves.

Book 4 (just added to the WAC Clearinghouse collection in April 2013): Programs and Practices: Writing Across the Secondary School Program, edited in 1994 by Pamela B. Farrell-Childers, Anne Ruggles Gere, and Art Young, is available at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/programs/ courtesy of the partnership between WAC Clearinghouse and NCTE.

This collection addresses how writing across the curriculum has been incorporated into schoolwide, districtwide, and statewide programs. The editors and contributors show how WAC efforts, and particularly those that begin with small groups of teachers working in a limited number of classrooms, can serve as the catalyst for systemic change. The essays explore the philosophical foundations for WAC programs and offer a number of specific classroom applications that provide the explanatory power of practical experience. Readers of this collection will discover how others have nurtured WAC through the creation of environments in which WAC becomes central to an institution’s educational mission. They will also discover how individual schools, school districts, and state agencies have worked to institutionalize WAC.