Scientists and Science Writing
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It should come as no surprise to most BioJobBlog readers that scientists are not known for their writing or literary skills. And, for the most part, graduate students in the life sciences receive little or no instruction or training in scientific writing. This wasn’t always the case. When I entered graduate school at the University Of Wisconsin way back in 1974, Joe Wilson, Chairman of the Department of Bacteriology at the time, insisted that all incoming graduate students take a semester-long course in scientific writing. Most of my peers thought it was a colossal waste of time but by the end of the semester we all knew how, in theory, to write a scientific paper, understood the peer review process and if nothing else could write something that resembled a scientific manuscript when asked to do so. I personally learned a lot during the course and thought it was extremely useful.
I currently work as a freelance science/medical writer and I think the course has served me well throughout my career. In fact, while a tenure-track Assistant Professor at the University of Miami School of Medicine, many of my colleagues would give me their RO1 applications to review for content, grammar and editing before submitting them to NIH. As the former Chairman of my department said to me after I asked him what he thought after reading my first grant application, “It is extremely well written from a literary standpoint”. Not exactly what I wanted to hear but maybe that explains why I am a science writer and no longer an academic. So it goes....!
The reason that I am rambling on about scientists and their poor writing skills is that things haven’t gotten much better over the 35 year since I took that mandatory writing course as first semester graduate student at UW. Based on my observations, graduate students are only asked to do original writing when preparing their theses and in some instances when writing manuscripts (which are usually re-written by their mentors). What is even more troubling is that science undergraduate students do virtually no writing at all! How then do we expect graduate students and postdocs to successfully write grant application and manuscripts if they receive no formal training in science writing?
To that end, I came across an interesting, albeit humorous, post from Dr. Isis, who according to her bio is “a physiologist at a major research university working on some terribly impressive stuff. She blogs about balancing her research career with the demands of raising small children, how to succeed as a woman in academia, and anything else she finds interesting.” Like me, Dr. Isis, doesn’t think that scientists spend enough time teaching other scientists how to write. In the post she offers some ideas, tips and solution to this increasingly vexing problem!
Basic Writing Resources for Basic Scientists
Dr. Isis does hot science. Hot, hot, caliente science. I feel like we have already established that, though.
Learning to do hot science has not been a trivial thing, but learning to write in the scientific arena was orders of magnitude harder. It's still something that does not come easy for me and that I have had to practice to improve. I learned the first time I received my first crapvalanche of papers from a group of students that I am not the only one who has had trouble translating the suckquake of writing I learned in high school and as an undergraduate into successful scientific writing.
I wonder if scientific writing is something that we don't spend enough time teaching pre-graduate school level students. I know that in science courses I've taught that have required papers, the most formal instruction time I have been able to devote to writing is showing them this:
Video 1: Strong Bad teaches us how to write a successful paper. Strong Bad is full of wisdom and has taught me about 90% of the awesome stuff I know. I'd encourage you to check him out here.
But, I digress. This long, overly drawn-out, unnecessary introduction had tweo purposes -- 1) to give me an excuse to use Strong Bad in a blog. I <3 Strong Bad. 2) to point the following resource out to you.
This weekend someone showed me "Ask Betty: Grammar in College Writing." Ask Betty is run by the Department of English at the University of Washington and has all sorts of great information. It has a list of common editing symbols for those of us who edits papers and a lesson on common grammatical mistakes for those of us who are writing papers. I think this site could potentially be a fantastic resource for those of use who speak English as a second language. There's a Q&A page with examples of phrases and discussion of whether they are well-written. There is also a resource page with links to external writing resources.
Addendum: While Dr. Isis offers a good self-help solution to the problem, perhaps it might be more useful if graduate students and postdocs are required to take formal science writing courses as part of their graduate training. Technology has advanced considerably since 1974 and students no longer have to take time out from their busy schedules to attend a bricks and mortar class like I did. The course could be offered online and students could complete it at their own speed. The growing number of foreign graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, whose primary language isn’t English, suggests that a course like this may be in the best interests of American science.
Until next time....
Good Luck and Good Job Hunting!!!!
Like it or not, writing a carefully-constructed resume or curriculum vitae (as resumes are known in scientific circles) is a vital part of any successful job search. Inexperienced job seekers tend to hastily craft resumes without paying much attention to format, style or content and then wonder why they can’t land job interviews. The best way to approach resume writing is to think of a resume as a work of art–something that requires a lot of thought, creativity and attention to detail. As one well-known professional recruiter and job search expert put it”Trying to find a job without a smart, well-crafted resume is like showing up for dinner at a fancy restaurant in a T-shirt and cutoffs. They won’t let you in.” 
While the economy is showing signs of a possible recovery, the unemployment numbers continue to rise. For this reason, it is a good idea to keep your resume as up-to-date as possible. Yes, I know it is a hassle to update and stay on top of you resume especially if you already have a job. However, in these uncertain financial times, you never know when you might be back on the job market. To that end, I highly recommend a piece on .jpg)
Back in the day—when the economy was sound and jobs were plentiful—an adequately written resume with a sprinkling of keywords and strategically-placed human resources clichés were sufficient to get your foot in the door at most companies. However, in today’s troubled economy where unemployment is rampant, there are certain buzz words and phrases that no longer resonate with hiring managers. According to Liz Ryan, an experienced corporate career advisor who writes for Yahoo Hot Jobs, the following phrases must never appear in a resume if you are a job seeker in today’s market. .jpg)
There is a perception out there that cover letters are old school and that they are no longer necessary when applying for a job. I suspect that this is largely a result of the notion held by many online job applicants that software programs rather than humans evaluate the suitability of prospective job candidates. While this may be true, it never hurts to differentiate yourself from the thousands of others who applied for the same position and didn’t include a cover letter. Further, adding a cover letters allows you to pepper your job application with key words that you may not have been able to squeeze into your resume and may give you a leg up on the competition!.gif)
Last month, 240,000 American workers lost their jobs. Many of these jobs were lost as a result of corporate lay offs and restructuring—things that are likely to continue as we attempt to navigate a course through these financially troubling times. Unlike being fired, lay offs and job losses that result from restructuring have little to do with individual job performances and everything to do with budget constraints and reductions. That said how should a person who is laid off from a job deal with it on a resume when looking for a new job? I found a .jpg)
As much as I hate to admit it, I have been fired at least three times (usually for insubordination or rabble rousing) from jobs in my long and illustrious career. My guess is that anybody who has worked in the private sector has been fired at least once! Of course, nobody ever admits (unless asked) that they have been fired from a job. The point is that many people get fired and if you’re one of the unlucky people who get does fired; you will need to know how to deal with a “termination” on your resume. After all, once you are fired, you will likely need to look for a new job!.jpg)
I became a medical/science writer after a rather circuitous, unconventional and sometimes, checkered career. Along the way, I learned a few things that I thought would be important to share with other PhDs who are seeking to change careers, t broaden their horizons and or simply to bring home a paycheck! I am sure that I missed a few things but here are my top 10 reasons to consider a career in medical/science writing:.jpg)
People who become scientists spend many years learning how to design, conduct, collect and analyze data from the experiments that they conduct. The ultimate goal of this seemingly endless exercise is to craft peer-reviewed publications that either support or refute the underlying hypotheses used to initiate the experiments in the first place. As part of our training, we are repeatedly reminded that it is our obligation to fastidiously and accurately report the results of our experiments and to assume “full ownership of the manuscripts and publications" that we author. The idea of allowing a person who didn’t participate in the design or execution of the research, to craft a manuscript for peer review is something that is virtually unheard of in the scientific community and, in the minds of some scientists, tantamount to scientific misconduct or fraud.
I am sitting in Newark Airport waiting for my flight to San Diego which, not surprisingly, has been delayed for about 2 hours. As you might have guessed from the title of this post, I am on my way to the 2008 FASEB Career Development Symposium which is run every year at the annual FASEB meeting. 
Like it or not, writing a carefully-constructed resume or curriculum vitae (as resumes are known in scientific circles) is a vital part of any successful job search. Inexperienced job seekers tend to hastily craft resumes without paying much attention to format, style or content and then wonder why they can’t land job interviews. The best way to approach resume writing is to think of a resume as a work of art–something that requires a lot of thought, creativity and attention to detail. As one well-known professional recruiter and job search expert put it”Trying to find a job without a smart, well-crafted resume is like showing up for dinner at a fancy restaurant in a T-shirt and cutoffs. They won’t let you in.” .jpg)
Fellow blogger, Jacob Goldstein, over at the 
