Communicating Science to Lay Audiences

Catalog description

There is a growing need to translate scientific evidence to lay audiences as a way to foster trust in science and facilitate uptake of behavior changes and evidence-based best practices in health policies. However, many researchers do not have the training to disseminate their research to lay audiences. In this course, you will engage in hands-on training to develop lay summaries, animated video scripts, policy briefs, infographics, op-eds and presentations. Each class will be devoted to a few readings and discussion followed by in-class practice of the assigned deliverable. You will focus on one specific article for most activities, lay summary, video script and presentation, and the article related topic area for the policy brief, infographic and op-ed. We will focus on three topic areas - HIV, substance use and obesity. This course is limited to 12 students.