2021 Student Research Conference: Communicating Your Research

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by UVM FOUR27 views·Updated Mar 4, 2021
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Thanks for checking out our virtual SRC workshop! Learn tips for adjusting your research communication style and how to use an elevator pitch and contact Vivien Enriquez, Undergraduate Research Coordinator at Vivien.Enriquez@uvm.edu with any questions. Enjoy!

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  1. Hi. Thanks for stopping by our Virtual Student Research Conference
  2. Workshop. My name is Vivian and I'm the undergraduate research
  3. coordinator in the Office of Fellowships Opportunities, an undergraduate research
  4. here at UVM.
  5. This workshop will be going over a few helpful tips.
  6. Um, for when you're thinking about communicating your research to
  7. a wide audience.
  8. Additionally, I'll be discussing some tips for how to adjust
  9. your research communication, depending on the setting and platform.
  10. So let's go ahead and get started and jump right
  11. in. The first step to providing clear communication is to
  12. know your audience.
  13. Now your audience will likely differ depending on your presentation
  14. setting. For example, are you talking among peers?
  15. Are you talking to your research advisor at an outreach
  16. event or at a formal conference?
  17. So, at a public event like the Student Research Conference,
  18. you may not know exactly who your audience is, um
  19. or who Your virtual viewers, Maybe in this case, so
  20. in this situation, it's important to tailor your communication to
  21. fit somewhere between a novice or someone new and an
  22. expert in your field.
  23. You want to give enough background information and context, so
  24. someone who is new can follow along while also describing
  25. your research, um, in a more in depth way and
  26. describing how it's moving your field forward.
  27. So for our next time, try to communicate your research
  28. as a story Who are the main characters or the
  29. major players in your research?
  30. What does your research story begin with?
  31. Or, in other words, what's your hypothesis or your problem
  32. Statement And where does it end or what are your
  33. conclusions? Framing your presentation in this way will help your
  34. data come to life and will help your research become
  35. accessible to a broad audience.
  36. If you're curious about examples for what this strategy looks
  37. like in real life, try doing a quick YouTube search
  38. for popular Ted talks in your field.
  39. These speakers usually start off with something that's relatable to
  40. hook their audience, and then they take their audience on
  41. a journey through their presentation.
  42. This is something you can have fun with and feel
  43. free to be creative.
  44. Now, aside from any verbal communication, your visual presentation is
  45. just as important.
  46. Here we have some general guidelines about how to create
  47. a visually engaging presentation.
  48. Following these guidelines will help support your viewers by creating
  49. a visual structure to supplement the information that you are
  50. presenting. A simple way you can do this is by
  51. creating a distinct beginning, middle and end by using clear
  52. headings or subheadings.
  53. As you move through your presentation, consider what information can
  54. be represented as a figure or an illustration.
  55. Uh, instead of written text, perhaps you can include a
  56. diagram and infographic or a picture instead.
  57. If you decide to supplement with an image, you don't
  58. necessarily have to include text that describes that image, although
  59. you may want to give it a descriptive title to
  60. help situate your audience.
  61. So feel free to pause the workshop.
  62. At this point, if you want to take a closer
  63. look or a closer read at what type of information
  64. or visual information might fit into this beginning middle and
  65. end section yeah.
  66. Now, with all of these tips so far, it's valuable
  67. to be able to adapt your communication style.
  68. Depending on the platform that you're using.
  69. For example, at a formal research conference like the S.
  70. R. C.
  71. You want to create a professional presence that showcases the
  72. entirety of your work the day of your presentation.
  73. Now using social media before the day of, or even
  74. after your presentation can be a great tool, but your
  75. communication when using these platforms is going to look a
  76. bit different.
  77. For instance, using social media to promote your research before
  78. a conference is a great way to put yourself out
  79. there and to increase your number of viewers, particularly for
  80. a virtual conference.
  81. In this case, you'll want to create or craft a
  82. catchy post that will make people want to learn more
  83. about your work in just a couple sentences.
  84. Essentially, you're trying to pique their curiosity.
  85. Another platform to consider is how to communicate your previous
  86. research experience to gain future opportunities.
  87. Communicating your research in this way will likely take place
  88. in the past tense.
  89. As you describe your experience, your research findings or how
  90. your research experience relates to the future opportunity that you're
  91. pursuing, you may want to think outside of the hard
  92. skills you learned and describe some of the transferable skills
  93. um, that have helped you grow as a professional and
  94. a scholar.
  95. Stay tuned for our last SRC workshop for some more
  96. information and tips about taking your research experience beyond the
  97. student research conference.
  98. Okay, so the last tip I want to cover in
  99. this virtual workshop is about an elevator pitch.
  100. Now perhaps some people have heard about an elevator pitch,
  101. and they already know what it is.
  102. But in case this is brand new for you, I
  103. just want to take a second to describe this concept.
  104. So an elevator pitch is a very brief description of
  105. your research that's no longer than a minute or two,
  106. or about the length of time that you spend writing
  107. in an elevator.
  108. The idea is that you'd use your elevator pitch to
  109. get someone who's new to your research, excited about your
  110. research topic in a quick, very short amount of time.
  111. In essence, an elevator pitch is a brief statement that
  112. summarizes your work.
  113. It focuses on the big picture, and it doesn't use
  114. jargon. It's highly engaging, and it leaves a lasting impression
  115. on your audience.
  116. Having an elevator pitch ready is a great tool for
  117. communicating your research to a broad audience in a way
  118. that's really fun and exciting.
  119. Okay, so now if you're curious about how to create
  120. a good elevator pitch or If you have any questions
  121. related to the student research conference and how to get
  122. prepared, feel free to send me an email at Vivian
  123. dot Henriquez at uvm dot e d u at any
  124. time. Or check out some of the resources that we've
  125. curated online on the S R C registration site and
  126. portal up.
  127. I hope this workshop was helpful helpful for you as
  128. you get started, um, in your registration process.
  129. And thanks so much for watching.