Postdoc Training: Career pathways

Focused Career Pathway Courses

These courses run once a year and are designed for postdocs who have serious interest in pursuing an alternative science career.

Biomedical Communications *New*

Presented by Biomedical Postdoctoral Programs in partnership with the University of the Sciences of Philadelphia, the purpose of this course is to introduce to postdoctoral fellows, regardless of his or her individual background, to the basic rhetoric of biomedical communication. Biomedical communications (scientific and medical writing) is different in many ways from writing in other professions or the kind of writing one does as an undergraduate-even in science classes. This course will not cover regulatory writing or medical journalism. The purpose of this course is to help prepare postdoctoral fellows for a professional career in medical writing.

Course Prerequisites: Your must have English composition skills commensurate with a Bachelor’s degree and generally acceptable for entry into any graduate level program. Please bear in mind that medical writing is an applied form of communications. To succeed in this class, you must already be able to write; you must have good compositional skills, command of grammar and spelling, and proofing abilities. It is very important that you reflect upon this before taking the class.

Format: This semester long course will be taught in live webinar format, and evaluations will be peer review based. This is a non-matriculated course.

The course is of competitive acceptance, as there are limited spaces available, and requires an application in addition to a mentor’s letter of support.

Interested individuals should contact:
Biomedical Postdoctoral Programs Office
postdoc@mail.med.upenn.edu or (215)-573-4332

 

Commercialization Course

This course, Focused Career Pathway in Biotechnology for Postdoctoral Fellows & Masters in Translational Research, is a sixteen week course offered once a year during the spring semester, and meets approximately one and a half hours per week.

The course is of competitive acceptance, as there are limited spaces available, and requires an application in addition to a mentor’s letter of support.

Presenters from the view of Penn’s Center for Technology Transfer, Wharton Business School, as well as industry will discuss topics such as biotechnology, technology transfer, intellectual property, licensing, and business plan development. The goal of the course is to give postdocs an understanding of the many career options available as well as what to expect and what is expected should they chose to enter this field.

Interested individuals should contact:
Yvonne Paterson, PhD
Associate Dean for Research, School of Nursing
University of Pennsylvania
Yvonne@mail.med.upenn.edu or 215-746-2356

 

 

Teaching Course

This course, Focused Career Pathway in Teaching, is for postdocs interested in university teaching.
Taught by a professor from the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education, it is a sixteen week course, offered every spring. The course meets for one and a half hours each week and attendants are given weekly assignments to complete.

The course is of competitive acceptance, as there are limited spaces available. An application and a mentor’s letter of support are required.

Goals of this course include:

• Systematically plan for a university course
• Develop at theory and philosophy of university teaching
• Develop evaluation instruments to assess teaching and learning in the classroom
• Gain knowledge of individual learning styles and their roles in fostering effective teaching strategies
• Examine the specific behaviors related to daily activities of college teaching
• Experiment with a range of technologies to enhance teaching
• Understand teaching in the Minority Serving Institution context

Interested individuals should contact:
Lashauna M. Connell
Diversity and Recruitment Coordinator, BPP
lashauna@mail.med.upenn.edu or (215)-573-4578