Blog

Giving and Receiving Constructive Criticism
Dr. Stephen DiNardo, Cell and Developmental Biology and Katerina Placek, CTL Graduate Fellow, Neuroscience
April 25, 2019, 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm
BRB 0501 (5th floor conference room)

You have worked hard on a set of experiments and on drawing conclusions from them.  Intellectually, you know that receiving feedback from peers and mentors on those experiments is central to your progress.  But, hearing criticisms can be tough, especially given the investment you have made.  Reciprocally, delivering critiques to a colleague in a manner that will help them can be just as tricky. In this workshop with Dr. Stephen DiNardo, attendees will engage in activities and lively discussion to develop ‘best practices’ for giving and receiving constructive criticism. Come and join to build on valuable communication skills that will serve you throughout your scientific career! 

Counts toward the CTL Teaching Certificate.
RSVP here
Contact placekk@pennmedicine.upenn.edu for more information.

Communicating your Science with Confidence
Dr. Nandita Mitra, Biostatistics, and Katerina Placek, CTL Graduate Fellow, Neuroscience
May 7 2019, 10:00 am to 11:00 am
BRB 0501 (5th floor conference room)

Public presentation of one’s work – whether at a lab meeting, conference, poster symposium, or thesis defense – is a challenge regularly faced by BGS students and is often accompanied by nerves and jitters. How can BGS students conquer nervousness to confidently present their work to others? Dr. Nandita Mitra will lead an engaging workshop to help attendees communicate their science with confidence, focusing on ‘tips and tricks’ to use for preparation, presentation, and managing feedback when publicly communicating your science. If you have a public presentation coming up or have dealt with presentation-related nervousness in the past, then this workshop is for you!

Counts toward the CTL Teaching Certificate.
RSVP here.
Contact placekk@pennmedicine.upenn.edu for more information.

Do you want to improve your science communication skills? Do you wish you found it easier to ask questions in crowded seminars and at conferences? Do you want to become a more confident networker?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, then you should attend the free BGS improv workshop in April and May. Improv is not stand-up comedy; it is acting without a script. It’s about think on one’s feet, solving problems as they come, authentic and effective communication, projecting confidence, facilitating team work, and not worrying about making mistakes. These are transferable skills that we need both in the lab and when communicating our science to our colleagues and the public. This 5-week workshop, led by professional instructor Sharon Geller, will provide a supportive environment for us to explore the improv techniques, stretch our communication muscles, and more importantly, have FUN!

Quick details:

Tuesdays (April 16th – May 13th) 5:30-7:30PM

Room 425 Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center

Instructor: Sharon Geller (Improv instructor at the Walnut street Theater)

We have limited capacity. If you are interested, please fill out this application form: https://forms.gle/BaPNcF64GqChLry77

If you have question, please contact Yunshu Fan: yunshuf@pennmedicine.upenn.edu

Workshop planning committee: Yunshu Fan, Rebecca Somach, Patti Murphy