A Course That Prepares Science Graduate Students to Publish

A course is described that prepares graduate students in the sciences to publish research, grounding them in the processes of academic publishing and encouraging them to publish their research in a timely fashion. This article addresses some key questions about the course: What previously unmet need does it meet? What subjects does it cover? How does it motivate its students to publish? Of what benefit is it to them and their professions? Student feedback indicates that students learned the publishing process well and were on track to publish before graduating or soon after. They worked on publishing articles to an extent not attained before the course existed, and they strengthened student-faculty ties, with the course producing a real reason for them to seek advice from faculty members regarding topics on which to publish. For graduate educators seeking to improve students' publishing rates, this article discusses considerations for deciding whether to develop such a course and describes alternative designs such courses might have.