Shampa Biswas

I am a learner, teacher, education specialist, researcher, manager, coordinator, and collaborator. I hold a Ph.D. in Language, Literacy, and Technology Education from Washington State University as well as two Master’s degrees, a M.Sc. in Forestry from the University of Natural Resources and Applied Sciences–BOKU in Vienna, Austria and a M.Sc. in Environmental Sciences from the University of Chittagong in Bangladesh. In my doctoral dissertation, we developed a graduate writing support model by assessing graduate student perceptions across the USA. In the small-scale study, the development of a writing support model, using Exploratory Factor Analysis, was based on a total of 302 graduate students. This study suggests the reliability of the survey instrument for further data collection to confirm the validity of the model. In the large-scale study, the validity of the model was tested based on a total of 1095 graduate students across the USA. Using Confirmatory Factor Analysis, this study verifies the five- factor structure of the hypothesized writing support model. The results confirm that the writing support model with a reduced 26-item scale fitted model meets the standard of goodness of fit criteria and confirms the validity of the final writing support model. Therefore, the study provides the conceptual background of the need of writing support for graduate students, develops a theoretical framework for supporting graduate writers in communal setting, develops a survey instrument, identifies a five-factor model, tests the internal structure of the model, confirms the validity of the model, and proposes a need assessment tool for promoting communal writing practices. 

At Washington State University, I served as a consultant for diverse and multicultural students in the Graduate and Professional Writing Center and completed a dissertation about communities of practice for graduate student writers. In these positions, I have worked with multiple stakeholders in business, industry, government, as well as graduate and undergraduate students and have developed techniques to help them address the problems they are encountering as well as in writing. I have numerous publications and my work has appeared in such journals as the Journal of Forestry Research, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, and the Canadian Journal for Teacher Research, among others. Moreover, I am very passionate about facilitating students across the discipline to explore diverse career opportunities within and beyond academia. My current areas of expertise include decision making, project assessment, management, collaboration, coordination and leadership. My educational background is both science and arts, which is essential for the position to support diverse groups of stakeholders across the discipline. Also, my professional experience in professional skill development, tutoring, teaching, and reviewing would be beneficial to support technical assistance, assess priorities, and fulfill training and mentoring needs of the position.

During my professional journey, I had to play multiple responsibilities for strategic decision making as a leader, a communicator, a collaborator, an assessor, an organizer, and a manager with diverse background professionals. My consultation experience with both national and international graduate students and postdoc scholars have provided me with a distinct strength of identifying individual students’ future learning support needs. Through writing consultation, I developed a strong sense of how to respect, listen, understand, and learn from students, and really understand their dream goals so that we know how to support their diverse needs. While I was appointed as a Graduate Writing Center Coordinator under the Writing Program, Washington State University, I incorporated my openness of learning from others. In this way, I efficiently engaged students in regular writing practice over weeks, months, and even years. I strongly think that my collaboration and communication skills with multidisciplinary and multicultural graduate students will be beneficial to meet the qualifications of the job. My experience in assessing programs, designing courses and developing professional training materials would be helpful for evaluating and monitoring students’ developmental needs and supporting their educational goals. I developed training materials for both graduate writers and graduate writing center facilitators, while I served as a Graduate Assistant and Graduate Writing Center Coordinator. I have been involved in data collection, management, analysis and reporting for 20 years in collaborative settings. It would be a great opportunity to apply both research and field experiences to evaluate insights and develop recommendations in collaboration with key stakeholders. 

At Washington State University, I served as a consultant for diverse and multicultural students in the Graduate and Professional Writing Center and completed a dissertation about communities of practice for graduate student writers. In these positions, I have worked with multiple stakeholders in business, industry, government, as well as graduate and undergraduate students and have developed techniques to help them address the problems they are encountering as well as in writing. I have numerous publications and my work has appeared in such journals as the Journal of Forestry Research, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, and the Canadian Journal for Teacher Research, among others. Moreover, I am very passionate about facilitating students across the discipline to explore diverse career opportunities within and beyond academia. My current areas of expertise include decision making, project assessment, management, collaboration, coordination and leadership. My educational background is both science and arts, which is essential for the position to support diverse groups of stakeholders across the discipline. Also, my professional experience in professional skill development, tutoring, teaching, and reviewing would be beneficial to support technical assistance, assess priorities, and fulfill training and mentoring needs of the position.

During my professional journey, I had to play multiple responsibilities for strategic decision making as a leader, a communicator, a collaborator, an assessor, an organizer, and a manager with diverse background professionals. My consultation experience with both national and international graduate students and postdoc scholars have provided me with a distinct strength of identifying individual students’ future learning support needs. Through writing consultation, I developed a strong sense of how to respect, listen, understand, and learn from students, and really understand their dream goals so that we know how to support their diverse needs. While I was appointed as a Graduate Writing Center Coordinator under the Writing Program, Washington State University, I incorporated my openness of learning from others. In this way, I efficiently engaged students in regular writing practice over weeks, months, and even years. I strongly think that my collaboration and communication skills with multidisciplinary and multicultural graduate students will be beneficial to meet the qualifications of the job. My experience in assessing programs, designing courses and developing professional training materials would be helpful for evaluating and monitoring students’ developmental needs and supporting their educational goals. I developed training materials for both graduate writers and graduate writing center facilitators, while I served as a Graduate Assistant and Graduate Writing Center Coordinator. I have been involved in data collection, management, analysis and reporting for 20 years in collaborative settings. It would be a great opportunity to apply both research and field experiences to evaluate insights and develop recommendations in collaboration with key stakeholders. 

Education

2012-2017 Ph.D.  Language and Literacy Education, Department of Teaching and Learning, College of Education, Washington State University, Pullman, USA. Dissertation: An Exploratory Study on Writing Support for Graduate Students.