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SPH Writing Guide Serves as Online Student Resource.

March 15, 2019
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Perhaps it’s the tedious organizational process, or the endless quest for the perfect word, but writing assignments often provoke frustration and self-doubt among public health students. In a field that centers around data, statistics, and science, many students—and seasoned professionals—find it difficult to translate their thoughts or research findings into eloquent and persuasive sentences.

To allay these fears, the School of Public Health launched its Public Health Writing Guide, designed to help students improve their prose, increase productivity, and meet the specific needs of readers. The online guide is the latest addition to the school’s Public Health Writing Program, which provides one-on-one writing sessions with a peer coach, faculty assistance in developing writing assignments, and in-class trainings for students.

The guide reflects the collective efforts of peer writing coaches, faculty, and staff. Jennifer Beard, professor of global health and director of the Public Health Writing Program, says the guide serves as a useful resource to students, whether they need simple tips or in-depth guidance.

“We often expect our students to be able to write when they come here,” says Beard. “If they haven’t written in a while, they get rusty, and need lots of practice and people who will talk to them about their writing.”

The guide provides tips and strategies vis a vis a variety of documents that public health professionals might produce over their careers, including literature reviews, grant proposals, policy briefs, and letters to the editor. Beard notes that students have studied a variety of majors and may not understand what public health writing entails, or are used to writing for a professor, rather than specific audiences.

“We—faculty, staff, researchers—all use public health jargon and tend to forget about the ‘public’ part of public health writing,” Beard says. “We want students to be able to target a broad audience and write something that someone could actually find useful.”

Beard says she hopes to expand the guide and incorporate tips and input from public health professionals and academics at other schools. She and Director of Graduate Student Life Mary Murphy-Phillips currently serve on a working group convened by the Association of Schools and Programs for Public Health that is developing additional resources to support public health writing for students.

“The goal isn’t just to help students get a good grade,” Beard says. “These are skills that they will be able to use when they go out into the real world.”

—Jillian McKoy

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