Soft Skills Training for Graduate Students: Strategies for Effective Written Communications for Different Audiences
The Institute for Pandemics (IfP) invites University of Toronto graduate students for a special soft skills workshop to further develop their written communication skills.
About the workshop
Writing about interdisciplinary research at the graduate level can be challenging, not least because such writing requires you to converse across subject and audience silos. This workshop will introduce strategies for increasing your rhetorical flexibility by exploring how information structure in your writing affects the reading experience of different audiences. Join us for a discussion of authentic examples and hands-on exercises designed to improve information flow in your written messaging.
Key learning outcomes
Participants will leave the soft skills workshop with:
- An appreciation for the differences between what you need and what readers need in writing about complex topics.
- A better understanding of where to place key information in your writing for maximum impact.
- Increased awareness of how to use power positions effectively in your sentences, paragraphs, and sections.
About the presenter
Fiona Coll is an Assistant Professor of Graduate Communication, Teaching Stream at the Institute for Studies in Transdisciplinary Engineering Education & Practice (ISTEP) and the Graduate Centre for Academic Communication (GCAC). Her research interests include historical conceptions of the relationship between technology and creativity, the role that affect plays in teaching and learning experiences, and the emerging challenges of graduate-level research writing. She is currently co-editing a book collection called Writing Together: Building Social Writing Opportunities for Graduate Students.
