Technical Writing for Introductory Science Courses – Proficiency Building for Majors and Non‐majors.

Technical writing is a necessary skill for many allied health professionals, yet students tend to get very little instruction in gaining proficiency for this skill. Undergraduate students gained technical writing proficiency through a series of exercises within inquiry based labs while enrolled in either General Biology (BIO112) or Anatomy and Physiology (BIO261/262) at the University of Maine at Presque Isle (UMPI). Tutorials were developed and created by members of the Virtual Academic Writing Lab & Tutoring (VAULT) Project that provided supplemental instruction for technical writing deliverables within the lab courses. Building assignments throughout the course used rubrics that measured student attempts and provided on‐time feedback that allowed for students to hewn their writing skills. Building assignments were introduced as segments (in the following order; Plagiarism/Citation, Methods, Results, Introduction, Discussion, Abstract), and students were given multiple attempts for success. All students gained incremental proficiency in technical writing and by the end of the semester were able to write a high quality lab report that successfully met the proficiency standard. Writing precisely and concisely is a skill that must be taught for today's allied health professionals as they are the first line communicators between patients and managed health care. These methods show that all students can gain proficiency in technical writing without an undue grading burden to the course instructor.