Toggle left nav

 

Carolyn Seefer

Carolyn Seefer, Diablo Valley College business professor, is the current co-author of a business English textbook, Business English, 10th Edition, published by Cengage Learning.

Seefer, who has been teaching at DVC since 1996, has worked with Mary Ellen Guffey, the author, on previous editions.

“I have been working with Mary Ellen Guffey for many years now,” Seefer said. “I was contributing editor of the 9th Edition, and she hired me as the co-author for the 10th edition. In that role, I was completely responsible for updating and revising the book.”

The book, which is a college-level textbook, was released several months ago, and Seefer said she currently uses it in her Business English (BUS 101) classes at DVC. According to the publisher, Business English, 10th Edition “makes students into successful communicators in any business arena with its proven grammar instruction and supporting in-text and online resources. The market leader in grammar and mechanics since its first publication, [the book] uses a three-tiered approach to break topics into manageable units and give you flexibility in planning your course.”

Seefer met Guffey in 1998 at an Association for Business Communication conference in Portland, and they have been working together since that time. They see each other once a year at that conference, but Guffey lives in Santa Barbara, so they communicate via e-mail and conference calls.

Of the 10th edition, Seefer says, “All 18 chapters in the book were completely rewritten to bring them up-to-date with current practices and to make the examples up to date. I was responsible for all the rewriting, and Mary Ellen Guffey approved all the changes.

“One of the things that made writing this book so much fun is that it’s filled with example sentences,” Seefer said. “I tried to make these sentences educational and business-oriented by incorporating into them business trivia, history and facts. In addition, I used a lot of names of my DVC colleagues in the book, so it’s always fun for our students to see names they recognize.”

Even though the writing was fun, Seefer said, it was a lot of work.

“Being involved in writing or revising a textbook is extremely time-consuming and difficult work,” she said. “There are many deadlines to meet, and instructors require much more than a textbook these days. Every textbook must have an instructor’s manual, PowerPoint slides, test bank, website, and other supplemental materials. Mary Ellen Guffey and I do all of this work ourselves, and I am very proud of the product we’ve developed. In fact, Business English is the top-selling English textbook in the country!”