Position Title
Associate Professor
Research Areas:
Biography:
Kory Lawson Ching is an Associate Professor in the University Writing Program at UC Davis, where he teaches undergraduate writing courses and conducts research on writing, technology, and pedagogy. His current work examines how AI tools are reshaping academic writing practices across higher education—focusing on what writers actually do with these technologies and what that means for teaching and learning.
His scholarly work has appeared in journals such as College Composition and Communication, Written Communication, Research in the Teaching of English, Computers and Composition, Rhetoric Review, and JAC. He holds a PhD in English/Writing Studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has previously taught at UC Irvine and San Francisco State University.
His research draws on qualitative and ethnographic methods, and he has developed expertise in UX research as a complement to his work on how people interact with digital writing tools and environments. He holds a UX Research Certificate from the Nielsen Norman Group.
Education:
PhD in English (with Specialization in Writing Studies)
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
2008
MA in English
University of California, Irvine
1997
BA in English (with a Concentration in Medieval Studies)
University of California, Irvine
1994
Awards:
Pathways Core Initiative Hybrid Course Redesign Grant
University of California, Davis
2020-present
Promising Practices Course Redesign with Technology Grant
California State University
2014-2015
James L. Kinneavy Award for most outstanding article published in 2007 in
JAC: A Journal of Rhetorical and Writing Studies
2008
K. Patricia Cross Future Leaders Award
American Association for Higher Education
2000
Teaching Excellence Award
Division of Undergraduate Education, UC Irvine
2000
Publications:
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
- Ching, Kory Lawson and Sabina Simon. “Beyond the Best of Both Worlds: Student Perceptions of Hybrid
Writing Courses.” College Composition and Communication (2025).
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “The Uses—and Limits—of Distraction-Free Writing.” Computers and Composition (2023).
- Ching, Kory Lawson. "The Writing Process Photo Essay." Prompt: A Journal of Academic Writing Assignments 5.2 (2021).
- Ching, Kory Lawson and Stacy Wittstock. “Teaching with Digital Peer Response: Four Cases of Technology Appropriation, Resistance, and Transformation.” Research in the Teaching of English 54:2 (2019): 161-182.
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Tools Matter: Mediated Writing Activity in Alternative Digital Environments.” Written Communication 35.3 (2018): 344–375.
- Van Ittersum, Derek, and Kory Lawson Ching. “Composing Text / Shaping Process: How Digital Environments Mediate Writing Activity.” Computers and Composition Online (2013). Web.
- Ching, Kory Lawson and Cynthia Carter Ching. “Past is Prologue: Teachers Composing Narratives about Digital Literacy.” Computers and Composition 29 (2012): 205-220. Print
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Apprenticeship in the Instructor-Led Peer Conference.” Composition Studies 39.2 (2011): 101-119. Print.
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Theory and Its Practice in Composition Studies.” JAC 27.3-4 (2007): 445-469. Print.
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Peer Response in the Composition Classroom: An Alternative Genealogy.” Rhetoric Review 26.3 (2007): 301-317. Print.
Edited Book Chapters
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Anxiety and Scented Candles: Student Writers Managing Scenes of Writing.” Under review for publication in Becoming Writers in the 21st Century, eds. Karen Lunsford, Jonathan Alexander, and Carl Whithaus.
- Ching, Kory Lawson, Tara Lockhart, and Mark Roberge. “The Locally Responsive, Socially Productive MA in Composition.” Degree of Change: The MA in English Studies. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 2016. 3–21.
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “The Instructor-Led Peer Conference: Teachers as Participants in Peer Response.” Peer Pressure, Peer Power: Theory and Practice in Peer Review and Response for the Writing Classroom. Eds. Steven J. Corbett, Michelle LaFrance, & Teagan Decker. Southlake, TX: Fountainhead Press, 2014. 15-28. Print.
Other Publications
- Ching, Kory Lawson. “Not a Consolation Prize.” Inside Higher Ed 2010. Web. 8 Apr. 2010.
Faculty Spotlight
- writing technologies, digital literacies, composition pedagogy, teacher preparation, qualitative research methods, socio-cultural theories of literacy and learning