Module Objectives:

• Help trainees become more effective writers
• Teach practical strategies for writing a variety of content
• Help each participant develop their own piece of writing
• Better prepare biomedical sciences trainees for a career inside or outside the lab!

Module dates and times: Tuesdays from 11:00-12:30p

• March 21: Making the Argumentative Moves that Matter in Scientific Writing
• March 28: Making the Moves that Matter One Sentence at a Time
• April 4: Hands-on workshop with Writing Studio Consultants

Instructor: Beth Estes, PhD, Academic Support Coordinator of the Writing Studio at Vanderbilt University

Module structure: The first two sessions will consist of lessons and activities that will help build a strong writing foundation for scientists. The third session will consist of a hands-on workshop, working with consultants at the writing studio to assist you with a piece of your own work

Cost: No cost to PhD students and postdoctoral fellows in the biomedical sciences or chemistry.

Eligibility: Open to Vanderbilt biomedical sciences and chemistry postdoctoral fellows and PhD students who have passed their qualifying exams before January 2023.

Questions: Please contact Angela Zito (angela.zito@vanderbilt.edu), Assistant Director, BRET Office of Career Development

*Admittance for this module is capped at 20 participants

Topics covered include:

• understanding reader expectations
• foundational principles of argumentative structure
• writing cohesive paragraphs and sentences

Section 1: In the first module of this three-part workshop series on scientific writing, we will focus on the big picture. That is, we will back away from the specifics of experimental results and sentence- level nuances to explore the structural moves of scientific writing, the importance of finding the story in your research, and how to write successful scientific narratives.

Section 2: In this module, we will explore how to make scientific writing more effective at the sentence and paragraph level.

Section 3: Workshop with the Writing Studio consultants