Hello,
I am taking a W class this semester, and I have heard that it is not as difficult as the hard-science classes. Is this true in your experience? What is necessary to succeed in Vanderbilt writing classes? Thanks for the input! I really appreciate it 
Writing courses vary in difficulty, but the first year writing seminars are designed to help first years get accustomed to college rigor. They aren’t overly difficult. Your grade depends on your writing ability, but as long as you attend office hours and take your professors’ suggestion and advice for papers, you’ll be fine. Make use of the Writing Studio as well.
Maybe this is just me, but I found that most classes that have essays are very subjective in nature. By subjective, I mean how much the professor likes you. This is an anecdote, but whenever I got a B or below on my first essay, I would go in to office hours to talk with the professor about what I could have done better. I regularly went in for office hours until the next essay, which I always received an A on. This method worked in every single class I attempted it in (~5). Maybe I got a higher grade because the professor gave some excellent advice on how to fix up my writing. Maybe the professor just liked me better. I guess I’ll never know.
The “W” from my experience means nothing. It only means you will have to write 3 papers, which is pretty much every humanities course at vandy (philosophy major here). They will do some stuff about the craft of writing, and usually have some sort of writing studio thing of some sort, but they are really know different. Derp’s post is empirically true, but I have gotten A’s on papers I have not gone to office hours before, and I have gotten B’s on papers I have, but generally a good idea. With that said if you are taking a first year writing seminar PAY ATTENTION TO THE RESEARCH PARTS, they will tell you how to use the library website which is not the most intuitive.
The real key to good writing is to not check your phone or facebook, or anything else while writing. I am being serious. one thing that I have learned is that every paragraph has to flow together and the entire paper has to be a cohesive work. Also, make sure that you brush up on MLA/APA format because you can lose points if your professor is harsh.