What WOLF is
WOLF is the NC State Campus Writing and Speaking Program's model for building writing and speaking into a curriculum. It works with a department, a degree program, or a college, and it also serves faculty who teach related courses as a group. The model follows the University of Minnesota's Writing-Enriched Curriculum: faculty-driven, owned by the department, and built over two to three years.
The work produces the Writing and Speaking Curriculum Plan, which the chair approves, along with revised assignments, rubrics adapted to the discipline, and evidence of student learning. Departments that complete the program earn CWSP certification, and each liaison (up to three per department or program) receives $1,000.
Who does what
Kirsti Cole, CWSP co-director, is the first point of contact. Roy Schwartzman, CWSP's other co-director, joins the work, with a focus on speaking. The department chooses up to three of its own faculty as department liaisons. Liaisons connect CWSP to their colleagues, bring the discipline's knowledge of what writing and speaking demand, and keep the work moving between consultations. CWSP brings frameworks for teaching communication. Faculty decide how to teach their content, and responding to student papers stays with each instructor.
The program adapts to the communication contexts of each field, including scientific writing, technical documentation, oral argumentation, professional correspondence, and multimodal composition.
The three-phase model
Phase 01
Inquiry
See how the curriculum teaches writing and speaking now. Liaisons gather syllabi, survey faculty and students, and note where AI already sits in courses. Inquiry finds strengths, gaps, and expectations students must decode on their own.
Phase 02
Design
Write the discipline's writing and speaking outcomes by level, map them to the courses that teach, practice, and assess them, and fold in AI literacy where the department chooses. The result is the Writing and Speaking Curriculum Plan, ready for the chair to approve.
Phase 03
Evidence
Carry out the plan, collect student work against it, and adapt CWSP's writing and speaking rubrics to the discipline. The evidence feeds the department's own revision, and it completes CWSP certification.
Who leads WOLF
Kirsti Cole, PhD
Professor of English and Co-Director, Campus Writing and Speaking Program, NC State University
Kirsti Cole leads WOLF and designed the C²TC certificate. She has worked in rhetoric and composition and writing program administration for more than twenty years, and she joined NC State in 2023. Her work with faculty centers on writing across the curriculum, writing in the disciplines, and institutional literacy. Her current research examines how universities are responding to generative AI. She is a co-author of the AWAC Statement on Artificial Intelligence Writing Tools (2025) and a member of the Modern Language Association's AI and Research Working Group. In 2024 the Association for Writing Across the Curriculum named CWSP an Exemplary Enduring WAC Program.
kkcole2@ncsu.edu · kirstikcole.com (opens in a new window) · Research and presentations
Department liaisons
Each department chooses up to three faculty as liaisons. A liaison needs institutional knowledge of the department and enough trust from colleagues to hold an honest conversation about the curriculum. Expertise in teaching writing and speaking is CWSP's part of the work.
The CWSP Liaison Guide, WSCP Working Template, and supplementary resources for liaisons are available on the For Liaisons page.
Who WOLF serves
WOLF serves departments, degree programs, and colleges revising their curriculum or preparing for program review. It also serves groups of faculty who teach related writing- or speaking-intensive courses.
First-time participants are welcome. Engagements are renewable. Faculty who complete one often return to extend the work or carry it into more courses.