Graduate-level research communication course: Reflections on the first offering

In Fall 2022, I offered a new course on research communication within the Graduate Program in Acoustics at Penn State. With 8 students from Acoustics and Biomedical Engineering, the course was split into three modules of grant writing, paper writing, and outreach. I found the students were reasonably adept at critically reading single papers. They also generally understood the mechanics of writing sentences, although combining sentences into paragraphs, connecting ideas, reducing fluff, and adding emphasis to key points were areas that significantly improved throughout the semester. In the middle of the course, two mock grant review panels were held, which highlighted a need to help students develop strategies to cope with critical feedback. Thus, for the final project, students had the option to either write a journal paper draft or revise their proposal; they also presented orally on their final project. Additionally, communicating with the public and developing outreach activities were included in the course, which culminated in an Acoustics Day at a science center. Overall, I found identifying gaps in the literature using multiple sources and developing a cogent argument on how their proposed work would fill the gap needed the most improvement. Partially supported by the NSF CAREER:1943937.