Because our Writing Program faculty are primarily contract/adjunct, we wrote grants to provide the money to pay faculty stipends for participation in the faculty development summer institutes. In these intensive summer workshops, the instructors invited faculty to reflect on their preferred classroom approaches and focus on developing individual strengths and interests. Thus, faculty were encouraged to work with those materials and processes that best capitalized on their preferred teaching styles. In order to maximize the attention we could give to each participant and to promote the sense of community we felt was necessary to our success, we limited the number of participants. During that first summer eight faculty participated; the following spring and summer, we repeated our grant success, and 17 more faculty participated. Faculty explored using email, discussion lists, the web, and MOO's in the classroom; they investigated presentational software and hardware (PowerPoint, Elmo's), learned basic HTML (each created a web site for their classes), and in the course of the institutes developed plans for implementing technology into their teaching. Our long-term goal was to have these initial adopters become a team of peer experts who would then share their knowledge with the rest of the faculty over the course of the following school year.
We began the summer institutes in a non-technological environment, sitting around tables in the writing center or in a seminar room, having bagels and coffee and chatting about what we thought technology should be able to do for our teaching. The instructors wanted participants to focus primarily on what they each felt they did well in their teaching, and then to consider whether any of the available technology could enhance that approach or activity. Each day we had a beginning and ending session away from the machines where we ate and drank and talked about what we were experiencing, about our expectations, our concerns, and our hopes for the success of what we were attempting to bring into existence. Of that first group, most were eager to experiment and explore their options. A few were cautious, wanting to see just what all of this would involve, and one unfortunately was overwhelmed with the alien nature of the experience and had to withdraw. As with most efforts of this kind, the first to participate were the most eager initially. In the later institutes, we had a more wide-ranging level of interest and abilities, from those who billed themselves as "technophiles" to those who bordered on the techno-phobic.
Positive Reactions, Pressing Questions
The participants composed reflections each night and compiled them in a journal. Here are some excerpts:
"I already knew a lot [about computers], so I was a little concerned at first thinking I might not have as much to learn. However, [in} the first hour, I learned more than I had in quite some time. . . I was impressed with the amount of information we covered.""Quite frankly, we've only been at this computer stuff one day and I already have dozens of ideas that I want to use in my class."
"I'm a bit of a techno-phile myself, so I'm always surprised to learn that people have such an apprehension about technology. However, this group seems willing to work to make this an effective workshop. . . (And I've already been talking up what I learned to several people, who seem interested in finding out more!)"
"After day two, I can honestly say I probably have enough new things to try in the classroom to last me an entire school year. I also went home and immediately crashed on the couch for an hour. The warnings of overload were finally beginning to hit me!"
Most participants appreciated the every-other-day in the 
classroom schedule which encouraged " . . . digest[ing] the information before having to move on to something new." And although they were tired at the end, they believed that "Pretox and detox [the daily opening and closing discussion sessions] were vital to assimilate and discuss" what they were going through. The participants discussed their excitement about new classroom challenges as well as their fears that they were being forced into this too quickly. And while the participants generally reported satisfaction with what they learned, they also expressed concern that they were being asked to shoulder the burden of yet another innovation. One reported having been asked, "If computers are so important to our graduates, why aren't the computer science professors teaching these courses? Why does it have to happen in the composition classroom?" She responded that she believed that using these technologies and methods "add to our arsenal of ways to reach each and every student." And then she asked us, "How are we going to convince the composition teachers that they aren't adding computer literacy to their syllabus but merging it?" And a few expressed a certain resentment, feeling that they felt they had little power to resist the momentum. All of these concerns are justified. Writing Program faculty are commonly the most overworked and underpaid of our colleagues, and too often the ones who have to implement new directives without having much of a voice in the shaping of those directives. Over the next few years the workshops both expanded (based on our growing technological literacy understanding) and strengthened: 1998, 1999.
Finally, there is real benefit derived from faculty raising such issues. Departmental administrators need to be reminded of what teachers deal with on an everyday basis. And, in addition to being conscious of these concerns, administrators need to be aware of the potential for new power struggles created by the presence of inadequate resources in the department: the internecine warfare that can be engendered by increasing demands on limited space, equipment, and finances; the potential for developing factions of techno-haves and have-nots, the increasing isolation of those who are reluctant or resistant to adopt technology. All of these factors can disrupt the life of a department and interfere with its primary goals of teaching and learning; therefore conscientious administrators need to be prepared to create an environment where faculty feel comfortable addressing these issues.
Some sample web sites from summer workshops: