Internal courses and training Workshop: Learn to write for the public and contribute to The Conversation

04-05-2021 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm Add to iCal
Online Zoom

The news platform The Conversation arranges, in collaboration with the Communications Office at KI, a training session for researchers on finding the news potential in your own research and writing for the public.

The Conversation is a politically unaffiliated international online platform for journalistic popular science articles. The platform is based on the principle that academic researchers write their own new articles, analyses and op-eds within their own fields of expertise – with the help of The Conversation’s own professional journalists and editors. Since the turn of the year, KI has a collaboration with The Conversation that also includes training sessions.

The workshop is aimed at researchers with a PhD who want to improve their ability to see the news potential of their expertise and to write short, quality pitches in English that can be turned into promising stories. There will also be a brief introduction to what The Conversation is and what this news platform can offer KI's researchers.

If you are interested, please contact KI’s communications office at the-conversation@ki.se. Please include a short description of your expertise, what topics you are interested in writing about and contact information.

Program

Presentation: how to write for a public audience

  • What is The Conversation (TC), origins and aims; what TC does and why
  • Why bother communicating research to the public?
  • What does writing for TC involve?
  • The benefits for academics and universities
  • Tips on style, tone and structure (with examples)
  • How to pitch (with examples)
  • Examples of different approaches:
    • A piece about the academic’s own research
    • A response to someone else’s research
    • A list (“Top five…”, “Ten most…”)
    • Something irreverent/entertaining/unusual

Chat/Q&A

Site demonstration

  • Editor takes attendees through the TC online editor
  • How article editing works, preview and history record
  • Demonstrate “traffic light” readability system
  • Note approve button and disclosure statement
  • Show dashboard and article readership metrics

Exercises:

  • Based on worksheet academics have brought with them, discuss ideas for articles
  • Each academic (or in teams of 3-4 if large group) develop one, write an opening paragraph
  • Group discussion on why topic is interesting to non-specialist audience, or how to make it so
  • Write a pitch for the article

KI The Conversation

Shared mailbox at KI for questions concerning The Conversation