The TPC Contact Zone: Preparing Graduate Student Instructors for Students’ Writing Realities
by Anna D’Orazio, Katie Monthie, Brooke Boling, and Alex Evans | Xchanges 19.1, Spring 2025
About the Authors
Contents
Anna D'Orazio is a PhD student in Rhetoric and Composition at the University of Cincinnati, where she teaches in the Writing Program and English Department. She serves as the President for UC's English Graduate Student Association and is the Graduate Student Representative for the Consortium of Doctoral Programs in Rhetoric and Composition. Her research interests center on writing through the lifespan, literacy studies, writing transfer, technical/professional writing, and student-centered pedagogies.
Katie Monthie is a 4th year PhD candidate in rhetoric and composition at the University of Cincinnati, and predominantly studies queer, feminist, and handcrafted rhetorics, as well as new materialist theory. She received her masters from Ohio University, where she wrote about the impact of writing spaces on college students writing. Her current dissertation work examines how clothing serves as a tool to compose one’s identity.
Brooke Boling is a doctoral candidate in English at the University of Cincinnati. Her research focuses on critical pedagogy, Appalachian rhetoric and culture, social movement rhetoric, queer studies, and technical and professional writing. She has taught courses in first year composition, business writing, technical and scientific writing, and critical pedagogy for high school teachers. Her forthcoming dissertation examines a qualitative study she conducted in rural Appalachia with high school writers.
Alex Evans is a doctoral candidate in English at the University of Cincinnati, where he is a Russel K. Durst Rhetoric and Composition Research Fellow and the Special Projects and Assessment Coordinator for the Composition Program. His research focuses on the history of access-oriented education, labor and materiality, and media studies. His scholarly work has appeared or is forthcoming in College English, Academic Labor: Research and Artistry, Prompt, and Punk and Post-Punk.