Dissemination of Undergraduate Research: A Best Practices Roundtable Symposium Hosted by Writing Across the Curriculum

Event Date & Time

Event Description

Pillar: Transformative Learning

Growing interest and demand for authentic undergraduate research experiences has created a need for opportunities that facilitate the development of communications skills. To quote Sir Mark Walport, the UK’s Chief Scientist (2013 – 2017), “Science isn’t finished until it’s communicated. The communication to wider audiences is part of the job of being a scientist, and so how you communicate is absolutely vital.”

This roundtable symposium will explore a range of models that have been developed across the disciplines by UBC students and faculty to enable the dissemination of undergraduate research. Models may include undergraduate research journals, three-minute thesis competitions, undergraduate research symposia and conferences, course-based blogs, podcasts, course-based poster sessions, and public outreach initiatives. Participants will engage in lively small-group discussions around how these different models are being used to facilitate teaching and learning. Of course, models are always a work in progress, so “lessons learned” and suggestions for potential adopters will be shared. In addition to gaining new pedagogical perspectives as well as teaching and learning tools, participants will network with a range of educators with shared interests.

The Writing Across the Curriculum+ Program (WAC+) began as a TLEF-funded collaboration between the Science Centre for Learning and Teaching, the Centre for Writing and Scholarly Communication and the Department of Chemistry and is designed to support the teaching and learning of written, oral, multimedia and other non-traditional forms of communication in the sciences.

Facilitators:

• David Oliver, PhD., Instructor, Microbiology and Immunology
• Eric Jandciu, Skylight Strategist