1. A Professional Memorandum Writing Workshop
Patricia Elliott, MPH Candidate for DrPH
Boston University Instructional Innovation Conference
March 2, 2012

2. Overview Innovation purpose Workshop components
Application to other courses
Questions

3. Innovation Purpose

4. Context
Course: Women, Children and Adolescents: Public Health Approaches
Assignment: Craft a professional memorandum informing a decision maker of a health issue along with a programmatic or policy response.
Need for innovation: Students lack professional writing experience.

5. Goals of the Memo Assignment
Synthesize information
Present ideas clearly and efficiently
Build career related skills
Create a polished writing sample

6. Challenges for Students
Professional writing ≠ academic writing
It is difficult to break successful habits
Short assignments are the enemy of procrastinators

7. Innovation: Memo Workshop
Students need practice and support to build new skills
Multifaceted skills-building workshop
An interactive in-class session
Students work with their own material
Uses lecture, individual, and group work

8. The Workshop

9. Components Instructional lecture Individual brainstorming
Group collaboration
One-on-one instructor interaction
Class-wide group discussion of prepared examples

10. Section 1- Memo Dissection
A close look at each memo section:
The importance of being concise and direct
Introduction
Proposed program/policy
Scope of the problem
Major constituencies
Current approaches
Conclusion
Instructional Lecture

11. Section 2- Partner Time Practice being succinct and clear
Students turn to their neighbor and must summarize in 60 seconds:
The importance of their health issue
A brief description of their policy or programmatic recommendation
Class discussion of challenges
Group Work

12. Section 3- The Art of Writing
Presentation of the nuances of professional writing with a focus on:
Tone
Formatting
Content
General writing tips
Active/passive voice
Grammar
Citations
Instructional Lecture

13. Section 4- Practice with Topic
Individual work
guided by a handout
Partner work
present ideas and ask questions to neighbors
Faculty work
one-on-one questions addressed by roving faculty and TAs
Individual and Group Work

14. Section 5- Analysis of Examples
Examples of each memo section are displayed on-screen and in a handout
Class-wide discussion of strengths and weaknesses, followed by faculty analysis
Slides, with faculty analysis included, are posted to course website after class
Class-Wide Group Work

15. Section 5- Analysis of Examples

16. Application to Other Courses

17. Application of Innovation
Direct use in other courses
Any course that requires students to write a memorandum
Applications in public health, public policy, business sector, etc.
Expanded use for the format
This multi-faceted format for skills building can be applied across the curriculum to help student acquire a variety of new skills

18. Summary

19. Benefits
Improves students’ understanding of the nuances of professional writing
Engages and challenges students to work through their own topic in a way that identifies hurdles and provides immediate support from peers and faculty
Offers flexibility for a range of audiences and educational goals

20. Questions?