Compression sessions, for those of you who have been part of them, are fun and challenging at the same time. For the unaware, compression sessions are part of the new set of initiatives kick-started by the USF Writing Studio at the turn of the year. 25 minute sessions instead of the regular 50, with a maximum of 2 sessions in an hour instead of the regular one and things pick up a lot of steam right from the word go.
From experience, I get the sense that most writers are unsure of how to navigate through these sessions and maximize their output from the studio. They come in with more than 2-3 issues to address and you as the consultant (and someone with the experience of navigating through these sessions) are often faced with the need to make judgement calls on what can and cannot be achieved in the ambit of this short, 20-25 minute session. This often comes as disappointing news for the writer, but most of them (barring one or two from my personal experience) take it well. So once the ground rules are established, it is often an optimization process in the head as to what takes precedence for discussion and what doesn't.
The most common types of feedback sought from me have been structural and grammatical in nature. Grammatical feedback often referring to sentence level interventions is one that requires a lot of tactful navigation from the consultant and I have often found myself treading dangerously through the thin line between elucidating my stand on the difficulty of the task at hand and sending back the writer disappointed. Sentence by sentence intervention is often impossible and it's important to let the writer know what the temporal limitations that these sessions entail. The focus is strictly on finding specific patterns of errors and zipping through the writing piece so as to achieve maximum output from the session. It is often considered wonderful if the writer comes in a set of questions in his/ her mind to be addressed during the session. If they are still insistent for sentence level edits (which some of them have been with 8-10 page long essays), I have learned to cautiously direct the writer towards other tools that may be present for them to address sentence level edits such as Grammarly, in the interest of greater good.
A few writers have also approached me with the need for structural feedback (Is this all flowing together?). These I feel are the most challenging ones as a writing consultant in that the short nature of the compression sessions makes it almost impossible for us to read through the whole piece and figure out the placement of each train of thought in sequence. Therefore, I often ask the writer to divide the writing piece into many keywords (say, two keywords per paragraph) which convey the main essence of it. This is often helpful even during the regular sessions, as it can be used as a guide to refer back and build up your own decision tree for the topic at hand. Structural feedback pertaining to flow of thought could be very easily dealt with in this manner.
In summary, the compression sessions make you think on your feet and there is a lot of responsibility to make that 20-25 minute session as productive as feasible for the writer. I haven't seen a writer who has left the space unhappy (as yet!), some writers have also showed up for their second and third appointments. It was all wonderfully giddy feeling in the head until a writer pointed out to me that she felt she felt she got more out of the compressions than the regular sessions. Food for thought, maybe.
By Nikhil Menon, PhD in Civil & Environmental Engineering
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