English 301 is an intensive technical writing class offered at the University of British Columbia (UBC). This course is designed to teach students the techniques that are useful for written and online communication in various professional contexts. English 301 is intended for students coming from a variety of disciplines. Throughout this course, students are exposed to various coursework that help them in formulating abstracts, proposals, applications, reports, and online communication pieces. In this course, students have the chance to work independently, in groups within writing teams, and with the instructor and TA.
Students start off by developing their own online website, and are introduced to some useful principles of technical and business writing. Then, students start working on their formal report project, explore and create a Linked-in profile, develop a social networking strategy, and start building an online Web Folio. As students continue working on their formal report project, they are encouraged to systematically work through the formal report while taking into account feedback received from peers. Students are also required to gain the skills to effectively research relevant job, volunteering, and school applications before completing an application package. English 301 urges students to continually reflect on their writing while simultaneously developing their self-editing skills.
The effectiveness of this course is clear as it aims to have students continually display the professional writing skills that were taught throughout the various part of the course. However, not only are these professional writing skills beneficial in courses, but they are also beneficial in communication with professionals outside of school and even in everyday life. Not many university courses teach students employability skills relevant to the real world, making English 301 practical for real world applications. For instance, before taking English 301, I did not know what a memo was. At the start of the course, I came across a memo posted at the lobby of my apartment building. This memo is provided in the picture below. There has been a sighting of bears around my neighborhood recently. Therefore, the building managers were just letting people know about the procedures necessary for refraining from attracting bears towards our garbage cans. After reading through the syllabus of English 301 at the start of the course and stumbling across memos, I took a picture of this piece of writing with “MEMO” written at the top of the page, not knowing why it was formatted the way it was. Looking at the picture now, I completely understand why this piece of writing is laid out a certain way and what purpose it fulfills. Additionally, I would have never thought that in the next three months I would be writing about fifteen memos of my own. This is just a very simple example of how English 301 can help us in our everyday lives when we communicate with those around us.
