The ability to critically evaluate scientific literature is important for graduate students as they begin their scientific careers.
However, a lack of formal training may prevent students from being able to evaluate the work of others in their field in the future.
“Reviewing the scientific literature and analyzing the literature is a big part of graduate student education,” says Sarah Klass, a postdoctoral fellow in UC Berkeley’s Keasling Lab and the Joint Bioenergy Institute and the main recipient of a $499,992, grant. of two years from. National Science Foundation (NSF). “But there’s no formal education” on how to do it, Klass continues.
To try to redress this divide, Klass and his colleagues will use the NSF grant to fund a new curriculum that will immerse graduate students in science “in the principles and practices of peer review and scientific communication through emphasis on building practical skills.” Peer review is the process by which many scholars review scientific papers to ensure quality before publication.
The team will spend the first year developing the curriculum. In year two, UC Berkeley grad students will put it to the test. The research team, which will include UC Berkeley School of Public Health professor Stefano M. Bertozzi and a select group of UC Berkeley students, will collect data on impact and effectiveness.
The proposed curriculum builds on the success of the journal Rapid Reviews\Infectious Diseases (RR\ID) was able to conduct rigorous peer review more quickly and efficiently, in part by training UC Berkeley undergraduates. RR\ID is an open access journal that prioritizes rapid and effective peer review as well as providing student training and mentoring and supporting the democratization of academic publication in collaboration with twelve institutions in low and middle-income countries that will be established in the next three years. . Bertozzi is the editor-in-chief of the newspaper
“As part of the UC Berkeley Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program, RR\ID organizers have offered a course that allows undergraduates to participate in research projects with faculty members for academic credit, focusing on topics of particular interest,” the grant application reads. “The goal is to familiarize undergraduates with the latest scientific and academic research, peer review methods, and publication standards, particularly in the area of infectious diseases.”
The new curriculum project will test the curriculum for the training program that will begin to include STEM graduate students enrolled at UC Berkeley, specializing in a wide range of fields related to infectious diseases, data science, health social sciences, engineering, and basic biological and chemical sciences. . “By providing graduate students with the necessary tools and skills to critically review scientific literature and review preprints, our goal is to improve graduate students’ research/literature understanding and collaboration with the fields of they are STEM,” the team said.
“We’re trying to teach good peer review skills to graduate students so they can help make peer-reviewed literature that can have an immediate impact on people’s lives expand,” says Klass.
Hildy Fong Baker, executive director of UC Berkeley’s Center for Global Public Health and executive director of the project, says: “Most of all, the intellectual discourse that should be happening around science is closed and separated.” “We’re creating a way for people to be part of the environment early in their careers.”
Course materials developed during the two-year grant will eventually be made publicly available through open access to encourage other institutions to adopt and adapt the curriculum globally.
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