English 101 is a required writing course at Southern Illinois University. Most students take this course during their first year. The aim of the class is to help prepare you for the complex writing tasks that you will do as a college student and later in your workplace and community. Students typically write six formal essays as well as shorter assignments. Some of the essays will be expressive pieces that tell the readers something about the writer and his or her experiences; others will be informative and provide the reader with information about a topic; others will be argumentative. (This is not, however, a creative writing or literature class.) Decades of research has shown that the only way people improve their writing is to engage in the act of writing; therefore, you will write all the time in this course.
For lots of great information about English 101 at SIUE, check out the English Composition Pilot Project site.