Boring lectures and tutorials. Getting to workshop your writing, however, was quite useful.

Interesting subject, but not a good one. Lectures are very unimportant since all the advices are very general and guest lecturers mostly talk about their own writings only. Scoring is really subjective since only your tutor score it (especially because it is a very subjective subject)

A lot of my issues with this subject have already been echoed by other reviewers - for example, the overall quality of teaching. Lectures in particular were teeming with eyeroll-worthy platitudes like 'Write what you know' and all the other rubbish us writers have heard a dozen times before. As a lecturer, Grant can either be taken as funny or corny, but when engaging one-on-one with students he can be quite rude. I did enjoy how poetry was taught, the tutorial activities helped me a lot in terms of improving my writing expression. Even lessons about drawing upon the five senses helped me a lot, although more established writers may find some lessons unhelpful. Like another reviewer, I also had Grace, but I don't think I'd call her a 'cold bitch' - maybe aloof and slightly annoyed at times because a lot of the students didn't do the readings or attend the lectures, but her feedback was very in-depth and I appreciated the depth of commentary she gave for our work. As for the readings themselves, they mostly covered a wide range of works, some bad, some good, which is understandably inevitable. But one reading of abysmal quality sticks in my mind: the poetry of Clare Gaskin (an entire week's worth of readings dedicated to her work!), which I couldn't stand. She also guest lectured one time and I got the impression that she is the Creative Writing department's darling which is unfortunate as it makes me hesitant to take up the level 2 poetry subject.

Amazing subject, horrendous lecturers and tutors. The lectures are boring and not even relevant as the tutorials cover everything anyway. Grant, the coordinator and main lecturer, is pompous and boring with the absolute worst jokes. I've heard mixed reviews on the tutors. My tutor, Grace, was a cold bitch that offered no help whatsoever, and criticised every single student's work without leaving any room for improvement. However, I have heard that other tutors are much more supportive. The subject itself is fun and quirky, and perfect for anyone who enjoys creative literacy. The assignments weren't too difficult at all, the workload is easily manageable and you make some great friends.

Incredibly supportive environment to develop and share your writing skills.

Not super useful, and the marks seemed based on who wrote well at the start of semester rather than anything you actually learned. Good bludge, though.

Depends upon your tutor as to how valuable you find the class, for the most part. My tutor was a poet, I'm more into novels: we weren't really on the same wavelength. I found the subject somewhat lacking in teaching you how to be a better writer, with mostly the 'read this famous writer and somehow absorb their skill via osmosis' technique applied, plus the occasional 'remove your adverbs' comment with no other input for how to improve your writing. Workshopping, while an intimidating concept especially in your first university-level writing subject, is probably the most valuable part of the course.

distinct lack of actual writing techniques and conventions (instead things like 'write from the heart' and 'write what you know' repeated over and over). Admin left something to be desired, for instance my tute was not told where to find the coversheet for assignments and my tutor never replied to her emails

Some of the lecturers seemed a bit irrelevant to the course material, but were interesting nonetheless. I really enjoyed the tutorials and met some great people who helped me improve my work, however the marking was so biased by tutor preferences that the results became quite unfair for a lot of people. I would suggest that the course-makers take this into consideration and consider using cross-marking or peer-reviewing as a second method of marking.

Decently taught, although a few of the guest lectures can probably be skipped with minimal impact. Grant Caldwell is an entertaining and informative lecturer. The tutorial teachers are outstanding and very helpful. The tutorials themselves are probably one of the most useful things you can do to improve your writing. Pro-tip: Make friends in your tutorial, you'll enjoy them more and everything will run better so you'll do better in the subject.