One of the key ideas in Freire’s work is the distinction between narrative education and problem-posing education. In narrative education, teachers push students to systematically memorize the teacher’s own “narrated content." Content is determined in advance, and students strive to contain as much of it as possible. In contradistinction, problem-posing education allows students to become “co-investigators in dialogue with the teacher” (81).  Freire explains that in “problem-posing education people develop their power to perceive critically the way they exist in the world with which and in which they find themselves” (83). Through this measure, students “come to see the world not as a static reality, but as a reality in process, in transformation” (83).  Even if instructors do not consciously draw on Freire in their pedagogy, they implicitly invoke his concept of critical literacy when they encourage students to construct their own concepts of course material through engaged dialogue and searching critique. Indeed, such methods have become the backbone of humanities-education at the university.
 
Nevertheless, the methods through which instructors assess their students, that is, how they determine which grades their students will receive, has not kept pace with the advancements in teaching brought about by an emphasis on critical literacy. Most assessment is done through the evaluation of term papers. In these papers, students must demonstrate their competence by adapting to the conventions of academic discourse. It is no secret that first-generation college students, international students, and other marginalized groups suffer most when a college course requires analytical writing. And students have few resources for gaining the necessary tools for effectively communicating their ideas to their instructors. Office hours are never long enough, and writing centers are under-resourced. Instructors, meanwhile, are caught in between. Many recognize the need to honor the unique voices of their students, and even some support the radical pedagogical aims of decolonizing their syllabi. Nevertheless,  discipline-based forms of communication draw a sharp border around a language community from which many students are excluded.

We want to change that. CWM allows instructors to engage with students throughout the writing process. Students gain direct insight into the strategies that academic writers employ when they attempt to persuade their audiences. With CWM students can find their academic voices.