Remarks on Composition to the Yale English Department

What can I say about composition that will be useful to the Yale English department in setting up a good writing program? It's clear to me that I won't need to say anything about special teaching methods that are tailor-made for the Yale scene. Yale's admissions policy guarantees that entering freshmen are going to be very diverse in their backgrounds and in their writing skills, and Yale will want to adapt to this diversity by using methods that are flexible and eclectic. Even if Yale did try to create a novel program that could serve as a model for the rest of the nation, it's doubtful that the elements of the program could be new or that the human mind could devise more methods and programs than have already been tried out. The problem will be to choose methods intelligently and to apply them well; and in order to do this, the one thing needful is not machinery but motivation—professorial motivation.

Hirsch, E.D., Jr. ADE Bulletin (1979). Articles>Education>Graduate>Writing