193 F20 Watts

University of Waterloo

 Department of English

 ENGL 193 

Communication in the Life Sciences 

Fall 2020  Online (Learn)

Instructor Information:  

Instructor: Hannah Watts

Office: Online! 

Office Phone: 17058498118

Zoom Office Hours: 1-3 pm, Monday / Wednesday OR by appointment

Email: hwatts@uwaterloo.ca  

*note: I have given you my cellphone number. Please feel free to contact me from 9 am to 7 pm on weekdays. Please don’t send me cat facts. Email turnaround will be 24 hrs for weekdays. I will not be available on weekends or holidays either by phone or email. If you send me a text or email on Friday, I will reply on Monday.

Course Description and Goals:

Dear Students; 

This semester is going to be a bit strange. I’m sorry if this is your first year, and you’re experiencing it with only online classes. We’re all going to do our best to move forward in these unprecedented times, and this means this semester may be a little more flexible or different than you are used to. If you want to talk to me about anything you need support with, or you’re new to Learn and you have a few questions, please email me to make an appointment and we can have a Zoom chat or call me and we can get to know each other over the phone.

In this course you will learn about effective written, oral, and visual communication in the life sciences. You will have the opportunity to shape these communication skills through iterative design processes that emphasize attention to your audience, the purpose of your communications, and student agency. You will work individually and collaboratively to understand and craft messages for internal and external audiences, including scientists, government stakeholders, affected communities, or broader publics. You will learn about a variety of genres while enhancing your capacity to conduct research and report research findings, communicate ethically, and thereby effect important change.

Learning Goals:  

Specifically, by the end of the course, you should be able to: 

• design, draft, and persuasively deliver scientific communications to expert and nonexpert audiences. 
• justify decisions about the language, content, and genre used when communicating  scientific information. 
• practice collaboration and peer review in support of communication design processes, including revision.
• practice research processes to find, assess, document, incorporate, and cite  research resources and communicate research findings. 
• describe and appraise the purposes and ethical concerns of science communication.

What I offer:

I believe a syllabus is a contract between student and instructor. Above, we discussed your practices. Here are mine: 

• I will respect your opinions, and the unique relationship you have to writing in English. My feedback will not focus primarily on grammar or mechanics, though it will consider it. While I will do my best to help you develop as a writer, I am most interested in how you communicate your original, creative, ideas. 
• I will bring my best to each class, and be thoughtful and expansive in any writing samples I share. 
• I will be open and willing to listen, give feedback, and help in any way I can. 
• I will listen carefully and attentively to feedback you have for me and my class, and I will give you the opportunity to offer it respectfully. 

Requirements:

• A Zoom account (Sign up for free at https://zoom.us) 
• Online readings. See course LEARN site. Links to these readings will be available at the very latest by the end of the day, Friday, the week before we’ll be working on it. 

Course Requirements and Assessment:

What these include: (Specific instruction sheets to follow)

1: Swales Introduction summary: 

• You will analyze the introduction of your choice of a peer-reviewed article in the sciences according to the CARS model, and summarize your findings in 250-500 words. 

2: Group Poster Presentation: 

• As a group of 3 or 4 (chosen randomly by me) you will pick a recent peer-reviewed article in the sciences and construct a highly professional, realistic conference poster. You will then create a video presentation that includes a group explanation of your project. This project will include a peer review process. 

3: Scientific Literature Review:

• It’s important to understand the conversation that’s happening if you’re going to join it! Literature reviews assess the scholarship of a current field, and identify methods, best practices, and what’s missing. Your literature review will use the article you used for your Swales introduction, and two others that it speaks to or cites in order to assess gaps in research, methods and practices, and important findings. 

4: Public Understanding of Science Project: 

• This assignment is based on exploring Public Understandings of Science (PUS), which often present science communication as a one-way model from scientist to citizen, and Critical Understandings of Science in Public (CUSP), which notes science’s uncertainties, practices, biases, and ethics. You will locate an original version of a scientific report and at least two popular press articles (1 blog post or podcast is also acceptable) that take up its findings of a contemporary scientific phenomenon to investigate how the public reacts to scientific findings. This project will include a peer review process. 

Participation: (25%)

Online Discussion and Weekly Activities: 15% 

• Offering interesting and engaged discussion posts when required that deal with readings, class connections, and interactions, sometimes including short worksheets, quizzes, etc that will help you engage with the course content. Detailed instructions given every week

Self Evaluations  (1 mark each) we will have two self evaluations, one halfway through the class, and another on the last day. Some questions you might answer in these evaluations: what is going well in this class? What is difficult? How is your time management? For the first evaluation, there will be a section to review how the class itself is going, including whether you feel you are being set up for success by me, the instructor, or not. Please be honest.

Writing Desk Visit: (3 marks) there’s a pretty cool place in Dana Porter called the Writing and Communication centre. At least once this semester, you’ll schedule a virtual appointment and receive help with one of our assignments. Find out more here: https:// uwaterloo.ca/writing-and-communication-centre/.  

Peer Reviews: 10%

• You’ll complete 2 peer reviews, worth 5% each —one for the group poster presentation, and one for your colleagues’ Scientific literature review. This means commenting genuinely and thoroughly on your peers’ work. For this process, you will be in groups chosen randomly by me, and you will be responsible for looking at work from 3-4 of your colleagues.

Course Schedule: 

NOTE: *Writing in the Sciences is a free textbook I’ll be frequently drawing from and will make available to you. I’ve shortened it to WITS in our schedule. 

Also, whenever you see the name “Learn Readings” this means you’ll have a reading that’s not from WITS that I’ll make available to you by the Friday before the Monday we begin that week. Ie. For the Learn Reading in week 3, you’ll have the reading by Friday of week 2. 

Important things:

Late Work  

• If you need an extension: email me with a justifiable reason (not, “I forgot about this”). If you can get a verification of illness form to me, that would be preferred. 
• You get one freebie, applicable towards either (not both):  Scientific Literature Review or Public Understanding of Science Project. You may hand either of these in two days late and not incur penalty. 
• Otherwise, late assignments are subject to a 2% per day late penalty.

Re-evaluation of grades: if you think you didn’t get the mark you wanted on a paper, follow these steps: 

• 1. Wait 24 hours from when you received your paper back and read ALL my feedback. 
• 2. Write me a detailed and thoughtful email that explains why you should have earned more for that paper. I will consider this as long as it’s not something like, “you suck Hannah, I worked my butt off for this.” Compare your work to the rubric or assignment instructions, and tell me where you fulfilled this criteria.
• 3. I will regrade your paper. Your mark will never go down if you do this. It may stay the same, or improve, but likely not drastically unless I made a major mistake. Which sometimes happens. I’m a human, after all. 

Basic Needs

Any student who has difficulty affording groceries or accessing sufficient food to eat every day, or who lacks a safe and stable place to live, and believes this may affect their performance in the course, is urged to contact the Dean of students in their faculty for support. Furthermore, please notify the professor (me) if you are comfortable in doing so.

Accessibility:

I am interested in organizing my classroom in a way that will be helpful to all of us with various abilities and disabilities, whether diagnosed or not. In some cases, we might need alternate forms of feedback or submissions. Everyone learns differently. If you have a need you feel isn’t being met, come talk to me. If there are accommodations that you can access through AccessAbility Services, see below. 

Note for Students with Disabilities  

The AccessAbility Services office, located on the first floor of the Needles Hall extension (NH 1401), collaborates with all academic departments to arrange appropriate accommodations for students with disabilities without compromising the academic integrity of the curriculum. If you require academic accommodations to lessen the impact of your disability, please register with the AS office at the beginning of each academic term. 

Counselling And Support Services  

1. Counselling Services provides support free-of-charge and protects your privacy. Call them at 519-888-4567 ext. 32655, or find them at https://uwaterloo.ca/counselling-services/.
2. MATES: one-to-one peer support program offered by Federation of Students (FEDS) and Counselling Services: https://feds.ca/feds-services/uw-mates  
3. Health Services Emergency service: located across the creek form Student Life Centre. 
4. More:https://uwaterloo.ca/arts/get-mental-health-support-when-you-need-it  Institutional-required statements for undergraduate course outlines approved by Senate Undergraduate Council, April 14, 2009  

Academic Integrity  

In order to maintain a culture of academic integrity, members of the University of Waterloo are expected to promote honesty, trust, fairness, respect and responsibility. See the Office of Academic Integrity webpage for more information. 

Discipline  

A student is expected to know what constitutes academic integrity, to avoid committing academic offences, and to take responsibility for his/her actions. Check the Office of Academic Integrity for more information. A student who is unsure whether an action constitutes an offence, or who needs help in learning how to avoid offences (e.g., plagiarism, cheating) or about “rules” for group work/collaboration should seek guidance from the course professor, academic advisor, or the Undergraduate Associate Dean. 

When misconduct has been found to have occurred, disciplinary penalties will be imposed under Policy 71 – Student Discipline. For information on categories of offenses and types of penalties, students should refer to Policy 71 - Student Discipline. For typical penalties check Guidelines for the Assessment of Penalties. 

Grievance  

A student who believes that a decision affecting some aspect of his/her university life has been unfair or unreasonable may have grounds for initiating a grievance. Read Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances, Section 4. When in doubt, please be certain to contact the department’s administrative assistant who will provide further assistance. 

Appeals  

A decision made or penalty imposed under Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances (other than a petition) or Policy 71 - Student Discipline may be appealed if there is a ground. A student who believes he/she has a ground for an appeal should refer to Policy 72 - Student Appeals. 

DO YOU HAVE QUESTIONS??!? EMAIL ME :)

@ hwatts@uwaterloo.ca