University Writing Program: Courses for Booth School students

Looking for information about Business 32101 (Advanced Professional Writing)? Unfortunately, the Booth School will not be offering this course in the 2009-10 academic year.

The University Writing Program does offer other options for Booth School students during the 2009-10 academic year. For an advanced course in graduate-level writing, you may wish to take Academic and Professional Writing (English 33000). For a course geared to the needs of working professionals, you may wish to take our non-credit evening course at the University of Chicago's Graham School, Effective Writing in Business and the Professions.

Which of these should you take? There are advantages and disadvantages to each class. Effective Writing is focused on business writing, so you may find it very helpful. It is not, however, offered for credit. If you seek a writing class for credit, English 33000 has been helpful to many graduate students, but it is geared to the needs of graduate students in the Social Sciences and Humanities divisions.

Why should this matter? Because writing must serve the needs of its readers. All readers seek writing that's clear, persuasive, and above all, valuable. But what's "valuable" will vary widely depending on whether your readers are the board of directors of Coca-Cola, the marketing department of a start-up, or a conference of sociology professors. Since most of the students in English 33000 are writing for other academics, English 33000 emphasizes the needs of an academic audience.

You may find, then, that while much of the course material in English 33000 will be directly applicable to your writing, some of it may not. To a great extent we can rectify this problem by assigning you to a seminar group with other people from fields similar to yours. We can't, however, guarantee that this will happen, since our ability to do it depends on who else signs up for the class.

For further questions about University Writing Program courses, please email us or call at (773) 702-2658.