Susan Miller-Cochran

Susan Miller-Cochran is professor of English and Executive Director of General Education in the Office of the Provost at the University of Arizona. She teaches undergraduate courses in rhetoric and composition and graduate courses in the doctoral program in Rhetoric, Composition, and the Teaching of English (RCTE). She served as Director of the UA Writing Program from 2015-2019. Before joining the faculty at UA, she was a faculty member at North Carolina State University (2006-2015) where she directed the First-Year Writing Program. Prior to NCSU, she was a faculty member in English at Mesa Community College (AZ). She also taught writing and applied linguistics and co-developed the first online course in the English Department as a graduate student at Arizona State University.

Her research focuses on writing in the disciplines, technology in writing instruction, writing program and higher education administration, labor in writing programs, and L2 writing. Her work has appeared in the journals WPA: Writing Program Administration, College Composition and Communication, Composition Studies, Computers and Composition, Enculturation, and Teaching English in the Two-Year College, as well as several edited collections. She is a co-editor of Composition, Rhetoric, and Disciplinarity (Utah State UP, 2018); Rhetorically Rethinking Usability (Hampton Press, 2009); and Strategies for Teaching First-Year Composition (National Council of Teachers of English, 2002). She is also a co-author of An Insider’s Guide to Academic Writing (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2017), The Cengage Guide to Research (Wadsworth/Cengage, 2017), and Keys for Writers (Cengage, 2016). She has been the PI or co-PI on fifteen separate grants related to technology, writing instruction, and classroom design (totaling nearly $120,000). She has served on the Executive Committee of the Conference on College Composition and Communication and the Executive Board of the Council of Writing Program Administrators, and she is a Past President of the Council of Writing Program Administrators (2015-2017).

Selected Publications

Books

• [under contract] Graziano, Leigh, Kay Halasek, Remi Hudgins, Susan Miller-Cochran, Frank Napolitano, and Natalie Szymanski, eds. Making Administrative Work Visible: Data-Driven Advocacy for Understanding the Labor of Writing Program Administration. Utah State University Press.
• [in press, expected 2022] Miller-Cochran, Susan, Roy Stamper, and Stacey Cochran. An Insider’s Guide to Academic Writing. 3^rd ed., Macmillan.
• Malenczyk, Rita, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, Kathleen Blake Yancey, editors. Composition, Rhetoric, and Disciplinarity. Utah State University Press, 2018.
• Raimes, Ann, and Susan Miller-Cochran. Pocket Keys for Writers. 6^th ed., Cengage Learning, 2018.
• Raimes, Ann, and Susan Miller-Cochran. Keys for Writers. 8^th ed., Cengage Learning, 2018.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan, and Rochelle Rodrigo. The Cengage Guide to Research. 3^rd ed., Cengage Learning, 2017.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan, and Rochelle Rodrigo, editors. Rhetorically Rethinking Usability. Hampton, 2009.
• Roen, Duane. H., Veronica Pantoja, Lauren Yena, Susan K. Miller, and Eric Waggoner, editors. Strategies for Teaching First-Year Composition. NCTE, 2002.

• [in press, expected 2021] Buck, Rachel, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Advocating Together: Pros and Cons of Cross-Rank Collaboration as a Strategy for Advocacy.” Transformations: Change Work Across Writing Programs, Pedagogies, and Practices, edited by Kirsti Cole and Holly Hassel. Utah State UP.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan. “Foreword: Reflecting on and Learning from the Past to Imagine the Future.” Pedagogy Perspectives on Cognition and Writing, edited by J. Michael Rifenburg, Patricia Portanova, and Duane Roen. Parlor Press, 2021, pp. vii-xi.
• Schwaller, Emily Jo, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Writing Pedagogy Education: Preparing and Professionalizing Graduate Students as Writing Instructors.” Approaches to Graduate Student Instructor Development and Preparation, edited by Kem Saichaie and Carah Theisen. New Directions for Teaching and Learning. Josey-Bass, 2020, pp. 65-72.
• Mapes, Aimee, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Framing Graduate Teaching Assistant Preparation around Threshold Concepts of Writing Studies.” (Re)Considering What We Know: Learning Thresholds in Writing, Composition, Rhetoric, and Literacy, edited by Linda Adler-Kassner and Elizabeth Wardle. Utah State UP, 2019, pp. 208-226.
• Malenczyk, Rita, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, and Kathleen Blake Yancey. “Editors’ Conclusion: Where Are We Going and How Do We Get There?” Composition, Rhetoric, and Disciplinarity, edited by Rita Malenczyk, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, and Kathleen Blake Yancey. Utah State UP, 2018, pp. 331-342.
• Malenczyk, Rita, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, and Kathleen Blake Yancey. “Editors’ Introduction: Why this Book and Why Now?” Composition, Rhetoric, and Disciplinarity, edited by Rita Malenczyk, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, and Kathleen Blake Yancey. Utah State UP, 2018, pp. 3-12.
• Rodrigo, Rochelle, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Acknowledging Disciplinary Contributions: On the Importance of Community College Scholarship to Rhetoric and Composition.” Composition, Rhetoric, and Disciplinarity, edited by Rita Malenczyk, Susan Miller-Cochran, Elizabeth Wardle, and Kathleen Blake Yancey. Utah State UP, 2018, pp. 53-69.
• Tardy, Christine, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Administrative Structures and Support for International L2 Writers: A Heuristic for WPAs.” The Internationalization of U.S. Writing Programs, edited by Shirley Rose and Irwin Weiser. Utah State UP, 2018, pp. 60-77.
• Fedukovich, Casie, Susan Miller-Cochran, Brent Simoneaux, and Robin Snead. “A State of Permanent Contingency: Writing Programs, Hiring Practices, and a Persistent Breach of Ethics.” Labored: The State(ment) and Future of Work in Composition, edited by Randall McClure, Dayna V. Goldstein, and Michael A. Pemberton. Parlor Press, 2017, pp. 130-151.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan. “Afterword: Building Meaningful, Institution-Specific Partnerships.” Rewired: Research-Writing Partnerships within the Frameworks, edited by Randall McClure. Association of College and Research Libraries, 2016, pp. 297-299.
• Gierdowski, Dana, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words: Understanding Expectations and Mapping Preferences for Writing Classroom Design.” Making Space: Writing Instruction, Infrastructure, and Multiliteracies, edited by James P. Purdy and Dànielle Nicole DeVoss. Computers and Composition Digital Press, 2016, www.digitalrhetoriccollaborative.org/makingspace/ch3.html.
• Rodrigo, Rochelle, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “QEP Evaluation as Opportunity: Teaching and Learning through the Accreditation Process.” Reclaiming Accountability: Improving Writing Programs through Accreditation and Large-Scale Assessments, edited by Wendy Sharer, William Banks, Tracy Ann Morse, and Michelle F. Eble. Utah State UP, 2016, pp. 36-51. **Edited collection won the 2016 CWPA Best Book Award

Journal Articles (refereed unless otherwise noted)

• Graziano, Leigh, Kay Halasek, Susan Miller-Cochran, Frank Napolitano, and Natalie Szymanski. “A Return to Portland: Making Work Visible through the Ecologies of Writing Program Administration.” WPA: Writing Program Administration, vol. 43, no. 2, 2020, pp. 131-151.
• Adler-Kassner, Linda, Anicca Cox, M. Melissa Elston, Genevieve García de Müeller, Ashanka Kumari, Vyshali Manivanna, Susan Miller-Cochran, Karen-Elizabeth Moroski, Mandy Olejnik, Peggy O’Neill, Mya Poe, Annette Powell, Shelley Reid, and Sherita V. Roundtree. “Building a Twenty-First Century Feminist Ethos: Three Dialogues for WPAs,” edited by Michelle LaFrance and Elizabeth Wardle. WPA: Writing Program Administration, vol. 42, no. 2, 2019, pp. 13-36.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan. “Innovation through Intentional Administration: Or, How to Lead a Writing Program Without Losing Your Soul.”)WPA: Writing Program Administration", vol. 42, no. 1, 2018, pp. 107-122. [plenary address from CWPA summer conference]
• Miller-Cochran, Susan. “Understanding Multimodal Composing in an L2 Writing Context.” Journal of Second Language Writing, vol. 38, 2017, pp. 88-89. [invited response]
• Conti, Maria, Rachel LaMance, and Susan Miller-Cochran. “Cultivating Change from the Ground Up: Developing a Grassroots Programmatic Assessment.” Composition Forum, vol. 37, Fall 2017, www.compositionforum.com/issue/37/arizona.php.
• Miller-Cochran, Susan. “Response to Larson and Kurtyka Column.” English Journal, vol. 106, no. 5, 2017, pp. 89-91. [invited response]

Research Interests

Rhetoric and composition, writing program administration, instructional technologies, L2 writing, labor practices in writing programs, scholarship of teaching and learning