Writing Research Proposals for Epidemiologists Utrecht University

Overview

Today, English is the main - and most widely internationally accepted - language used for writing research proposals, yet not everyone is academically fluent in English. Even native English speakers can often benefit from improving their English academic writing skills, the lack of which can lead to lack of clarity, confusion and rejection. In other words, the quality of the English used can make or break your research proposal.

We will analyze the structure, vocabulary and grammatical structures of research proposals, including word order, articles, verb tenses, punctuation marks, modal verbs, hedging, referencing styles, and the use of transitional words and phrases. We will also address the concept of plagiarism and how to avoid it.

Your own (draft) research proposal will be central to this course. Beside practicing on model research proposals from your own academic domain and doing exercises in grammar and vocabulary topics, you will work on your proposal and receive feedback on this from both your peers and an English expert. At the end of the course, your research proposal will be reviewed both by a content and an English expert.

In addition to improving your English writing skills, you will enlarge your academic vocabulary and gain experience in critical reading. You will learn to better understand your own strengths and weaknesses in writing in English, and be able to familiarize yourself with vocabulary and self-study strategies that will enable you to improve your own writing.

Learning objectives

By the end of this Writing Research Proposals for Epidemiologists course from Utrecht University, you will be able to:

• Display sufficient academic writing skills to write a successful research proposal
• Correctly structure a research proposal, and be able to assemble the correct information elements