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MJoTA Institute of Medical Writing Certificate
MiMW3: Job fair and marketing
1. Course number:
MiMW 3
2. Course title:
Job fair and marketing
4. Dates offered:
Rolling admission from 1st of every month
5. Semester hours of credit:
Six graduate credits over 2
semesters (7 months)
6. Course description
One of 3 required courses for students
in the MJoTA Africa Foundation Certificate Program.
This course prepares a student
for a career as a medical writer either as an employee or as an independent
contractor or as an employer. Week by week readings and assignments give the
student the tools to apply for medical writing contracts.
Onsite workshops (1 hour) are
given live by webinar on days that are agreed on when 3 or more students are
enrolled. Otherwise, students are taught individually by phone conversation and
access to materials in the locked pages. Online workshops can be given in
sequence on the same day with online workshops for the other 2 courses.
Saturday mornings (9am EST) sometimes work for all; so do Sunday mornings (9am EST).
Writing assignments include: a
targeted resumé, cover letters, contact with other medical writers, contact
with employees of medical writers, presentations on the skills and services
offered by the student, writing a business plan, writing a grant, incorporating
a business, filing for non-profit status.
7. Prerequisites:
Track 1: PhD earned in the laboratory, PharmD, MD
with graduate training
Track 2: Graduate of undergraduate medical, nursing,
pharmacy school, undergraduate degree in
sciences or journalism with
courses in the sciences.
8. Applicable student population:
Every professional in life sciences needs to know how to
present themselves and their data and needs to know how to analyze data and
present it to general and professional audiences. Students may be interested in
transitioning into careers in medical writing, but they need not be; they may
be interested in managing medical writers, creating for-profit and
not-for-profit companies.
9. Objectives/goals:
Students will
1.
search for information about each company that is
offering jobs or contracts
2.
assemble and present a professional slide presentation
demonstrating their education, network, skills and experience
3.
prepare a professional resume
4.
prepare a business plan for a medical writing business
or any other business for which he or she has skills, training and passion
5.
set up a website marketing services
6.
write a grant proposal to a non-profit foundation
7.
present themselves on social networking sites and
professional job-seeking sites
8.
when all the above objectives are completed, and the
student satisfactorily completed MAF1 and MAF2, the student is expected to obtain
a short-term or long-term contract, become an employee or obtain foundation
funding
10. Syllabus:
Topic 1: Medical writers, regulatory writers, career
paths.
Topic 2: Networking
Topic 3: Cover letter
Topic 4: Marketing yourself
Topic 5: Ethics and medical writing
Topic
6: Your medical writing business
Topic 7: Business plans
Topic 8: Grant writing
Topic 9: Advertising
11. Texts:
Online texts downloadable from the locked MJoTA pages
12. Grading:
Standard letter
grade, awarded according to a 5-part rubric (content, style and grammar,
documentation, success at writing for targeted audience, overall excellence) on
participation in discussions, writing assignments, and oral presentations.
13. Teaching aids:
File sharing software
and chat room software for online posting; standard AV equipment
14. Institutional resources:
Teleconference facilities for remote students
15. Problem-solving and critical thinking:
Students determine what contract or job they need and work
towards getting it.
16. Evaluation:
Students are asked to post feedback continually on online
closed discussion board in Linked.
17. Individualization:
Individual consultation with students, by e-mail, phone, and
GoToWebinar
19. Time described:
2010
20. Faculty:
To be determined
21. Prepared by:
Susanna J Dodgson
PhD
22. Date prepared:
January 2010
23. Date MJoTA Africa Foundation approval:
xx
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