I am reading this book now, and I love it! I am finding so many useful kernels of wisdom. Thank you both for writing an informative, accessible, and fun handbook on this important topic!

It's a great book, we are working through it now in a small faculty group

#NewReadingMaterial #RPVBooks I have always loved the work of @stephenbheard.bsky.social and can’t wait to read this book.

In case you're looking for a palate cleanse for your feed, 🥳YOU'RE INVITED TO THE PUBLIC LAUNCH🥳 of the book that @stephenbheard.bsky.social & I wrote to try to change something for the better, even if it feels really small: lnkd.in/e3eDjmKE 1/

Most of us are pretty good at spotting problems with grammar, word choice, sentence structure, etc., right? These small-scale “errors” are abundant in an early draft of anything, and it’s easy (if time-consuming) to mark them, and maybe correct them. 1/ #scientificwriting #highered #scicomm

Regardless of your field, this is a great interview for academics to read and digest: @bgmerkle.bsky.social on the history and conventions around scholarly writing, the paucity of instruction in it, and the ways in which we can improve this area of graduate education.

Ummmm...we sold out!?!? 😱 We thought this book was important; it's humbling to learn y'all agree. You can still order Teaching and Mentoring Writers in the Sciences for cheap! Use UCPNEW for 30% off the paperpack. 👉https://buff.ly/G5nWPqA #academia #scientificwriting #scicomm #teachingwriting

Can we also talk about this excellent illustration!!!! (but @THE, why no alt text!?!)

Someone said to me, "I'm sorry but I got your book from a library." Nobody should ever apologise for that. You read my book! That's brilliant! I grew up hanging out in libraries and the idea of a world without them fills me with dread. Without libraries, authors, like readers, will only suffer.

Look, I'm going to tell you a secret. If you buy an e-book while it's on sale, you never have to read it. If you have $2 to spare & want to help that particular author, you can just chuck the book into the oubliette of your TBR. Every sale helps. The author will never know, but you gave them a gift.

You guyzzzz! 🥹😱 Maybe teaching scientific writing better isn't as niche as we've been told! (Stage whisper: of course it isn't!!! But it sure is meaningful to hear it from someone else!)

Hugely grateful that folks like Tim are taking the time to share incredibly affirming comments about our book! We really hoped it would be interesting, useful, and readable, too. Truly. That was our throughline while writing.

there's a lovely discussion about scientific writing in today's culture study with @annehelen.bsky.social and @bgmerkle.bsky.social www.patreon.com/posts/behold... I'm not sure where I learned to write scientifically, but I've definitely been subject to '“read a few papers and write like that”'

Last year, I dedicated the lull between 12/25 and 1/1 to reflection, reading, and art-making. 🧵

The history of Euro-American #scientificwriting intersects multiple times with longstanding traditions of writing letters for business, intellectual, and intimate purposes. 🧵

I was doing a little inbox housekeeping today (old emails, not my 5k+ unread). And I realized: it's time to move my book project into the COMPLETED folder! 🤯 I 1st thought this book should exist back in 2015 & pitched it to @stephenbheard.bsky.social & @uchicagopress.bsky.social 5 yrs ago!!! 😱🥳

Please help me and @stephenbheard.bsky.social celebrate: our book is SHIPPING now*!!! 🥳 It's been a (long) labor of love & there were paper supply chain issues with printing timing this fall, but it finally exists as a physical object you can hold, highlight, and share with all your colleagues! 🧵

I'm on this project! Come work on #SciComm stuff with us!

Hi all! I'm hiring for a #scicomm research postdoc to join our Scicomm LIFT team! Short story is: 2 years guaranteed funding, open to remote or hybrid work, $61k+hearty benefits (see UW's 401k match in particular)! Please share with folks who might be interested! 1/

I like to jokingly say "numbers are hard" when I make a mental math error. But in all seriousness, it can be difficult for many to grasp numerical information, especially when it lacks rich context. #SciComm #MedicalCommunications (1/7) 🧪

Though I've been involved with a couple of writing-related retreats/workshops lately, most of the time I must fit my writing, art, and really any kind of creative expression, into the rest of the demands and opportunities of my life. 1/

YES!! Saying No is transformative - you have way less time than you think you do, and all those little tasks fragment your time and lead to death by 1000 paper cuts. And note once you start saying no, it takes a while to shed lingering responsibilities - it feels worse before it gets better!

I'll say it again: art & science aren't mutually exclusive. It's not just artists who are creative. It's not only scientists who are rigorous. We can get philosophical about this, but the key thing is that we can make our science & #scicomm look way better...even if we don't feel like an artist. 1/

Low-key 📢: I’m resuming a creative project I’ve done off & on for 20+ yrs & setting off on a long creative journey & most of the work will feel hard, imperfect. & I think we should f*ck perfection and lean into our innate, human impulse to be creative, no matter how it turns out. 👉

I'm officially on sabbatical*--an extraordinary opportunity, period, and one made more so by the fact that I don't have a tenure-track appointment. This is one point of equity that my institution gets right & we should all be advocating for widely in #HigherEd. 1/

I wrote abt word play to deal w/ #WritersBlock (buff.ly/bdbjLMp) w/ found poetry, collage, etc. Uncommon words for familiar things is another option. This list from @merriam-webster.com on unusual nature words buff.ly/gFSSgpM taught me 3! What's a list that could refresh your thinking?

Collaborators & I scanned 27 career dev, leadership & mentoring progs worldwide. Key insight: mentoring most impactful when ppl are connected to #mentor networks, not lone mentors. More here: buff.ly/VrLj9pn and read the original paper here: buff.ly/GSQJRcN #scicomm #HigherEd 🧪

I think of departments as the academic "scale" where most change is possible, because at the departmental we academics still have substantial (if not total) influence over the "vibe" and impact of the people in our departments (staff, students, faculty). 1/

tl;dr: saying no truly did change my life. Everyone from @loleenberdahl.bsky.social to the latest trendy "productivity guru" has things to say about unrealistic to-do lists. (HT: Loleen's stuff is *awesome*!!) 1/

Tl;dr: for the PhDs, postdocs, and early career faculty (hoping to be) among us, I have a recommendation for *the* book for early career academics trying to stay afloat (plus bonus recs). 1/ #scicomm #AcademicSky #🧪

So we hope the book (scientistseessquirrel.wordpress.com/2024/12/10/w...) will help with that bit, at least. But read @briles34.bsky.social's preprint - there's lots more to it!

One issue the preprint identifies is that mentors are super important - but they (we!) lack training in effective writing mentorship. That's exactly why @bgmerkle.bsky.social and I wrote our forthcoming book, 'Teaching and Mentoring Writers in the Sciences" - our next month.

I refuse to police AI/LLM use in my classroom, even though I'd rather totally prohibit AI in my academic writing and #scicomm courses. I'd also rather not talk about it, but that's just not an option any more. So, I've been using a course policy that seems to...NOT be working. 1/

In thus series, then AAUP members share their stories of repression and resilience in the face of partisan interference and violations of academic freedom. Learn more about the project at the link below👇 #academicsky #academicfreedom #defendhighered #highered #socialjustice #academia

Introducing “Faculty on the Frontlines,” a new series from the Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom that documents the stories of AAUP members! Over the next 2 weeks, we will spotlight the stories of 10 AAUP members fighting to defend academic freedom. Check out our teaser 🔥

"Good editing is about structure, flow and signposts. It concerns your audience and how they will receive it. It is not about you." - Melanie Smith See the full post for how to shift your views and approach to editing your academic writing. academiccoach.info/blog/how-to-... #academicsky

I've been a big letter writer since I was a little kid. Nothing compares to snail mail with a real postmark and handwriting from someone special. 1/

There are unhealthy myths about how much time people in #academia must spend working to be “successful.” Yet we also tend to be terrible at estimating how much time we spend working, or on a particular task or activity (hint we often way over-estimate time spent & underestimate time needed). 1/

I really think scientists still need to be part of the media conversation--even (or especially) when journalists deal w/ contentious issues. That's why I responded to this "tricky" interview request & encouraged two colleagues to. Here's why I think this matters for #scicomm:

I will add: we are immensely grateful for all of you who have connected with the Meteor #Scicomm podcast & hope you still feel connected as we work together to foster capacity to do good in the world. There are amazing resources to help us all (a lot from way beyond scicomm); we'll focus there.

I keep having this conversation with colleagues. We need to make it obvious to students that revision means success, not failure, as a writer. 1/

Darn right we are!

This is a great book for folks who need to train others in scientific writing but were perhaps never formally trained themselves. Which is probably a whole lot of us! Highly recommend.

@stephenbheard.bsky.social & I are pretty stoked! Our book (from @uchicagopress.bsky.social) about mentoring #ScientificWriting is another step closer to being in your hands!! We now have a cover, a *funny* index (who knew that was possible!?!) & amazing blurbs from 3 scholars we deeply respect! 1/

I recently led a writing feedback workshop with @stephenbheard.bsky.social, my co-author on a book about mentoring writing in the sciences. A lot of our advice from that workshop is distilled into a blog post I wrote a while back! So, I’m re-booting it in case you missed it: buff.ly/oIbXJdS.

*Now* is the time to handle end-of-term evaluations. As a contingent faculty member, I'm more subject to the whims (and biases) of bad evals than I'd like to be. 1/

If you teach in higher ed, you might still have a couple of minutes left to fine-tune your syllabi for the coming term. So, I'm sharing ALL MY hashtag#SCICOMM SYLLABI, along with all my syllabi for writing courses, career prep, and art-science/transdisciplinary courses: buff.ly/2BUHuOt 1/

*check OUT, not our. Blergh. But while you're at the booth, you *could* also ask about OUR new book too ("our" in this case being me and @bgmerkle.bsky.social) I bet Jeremy won't mind if you preorder his and ours at the same time! press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

I really think scientists still need to engage with journalists about contentious issues. That's why I responded to a "tricky" interview request recently. Here's my take on why this matters for #scicomm & how I handled a particularly touchy topic for WY Public Media:

I 1000% agree. After re-reading every word (& comma), I can confidently conclude: you should pre-order for the cheeky endnotes, alone! And, it is excruciating to reread a text I've written with the certainty that only massive errors can be changed. Zaps all the fun of editing.