CHEMICAL & BIOMOLECULAR ENGINEERING
The Program in Writing and Communication (PWC) has partnered with faculty in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (CHBE) since 2013 to create a curriculum-wide communication instruction program for undergraduate CHBE majors.
The program is designed to help CHBE students learn how to communicate more effectively both orally and in writing as they move through their academic program. To that end, CHBE faculty in collaboration with the PWC have identified communication-intensive assignments on which students would receive support in core courses.
Instructional support includes workshops on various communication-related topics, feedback sessions with instructors and PWC staff, and coaching sessions with CHBE communication coaches.
To assess the effectiveness of the communication instruction in CHBE, the PWC staff has also developed and administered three different instruments: a student attitudinal survey, a blind evaluation of student team reports, and a focus group with graduating seniors. Assessment findings indicate that students found working with coaches very helpful and that students show statistically significant improvement in writing skills when they receive communication instruction.
INDIVIDUAL COURSES WITH EMBEDDED COMMUNICATION INSTRUCTION/COACHING
The PWC also works with individual instructors to design discipline-specific support for students on communication assignments. This support can include in-class workshops, individual coaching, assignment and rubric design, and TA training. The list below is a representative sample of the courses with which we've worked in recent years. Note that our staff work with both undergraduate and graduate courses.
- ANTH 201
- ANTH 493/494
- BIOC 112
- BIOC 313
- BIOC 352
- BIOC 424/524
- BIOE 252
- BIOE 391
- CHEM 600
- ECON 611
- HIST 495
- HUMA 402
- MATH 376
- MGMT 594
- MUSI 222
- MUSI 733
- NSCI 399
- NSCI 511
- POLI 536
- PSYC 202
- PSYC 340
- SOCI 470
- SWGS 380
- SWGS 502