What is the Focus of this Course?

The following topics are covered in this course: the nature of technical communication, the composing process, collaborative writing, writing for different audiences, the rhetorical situation, effective organization and style, electronic communication, document design, visual aids, instructions and procedures, short reports, formal reports, short proposals, and oral reports.

INGL 3236: Technical Report Writing has as its primary focus to present the basic principles and guidelines for the writing of well organized, attractive, and user-friendly technical documents.  The technical writing skills we will be developing in this class will focus on communicating about the environment.  Environmental problems, for the most part, are highly scientific and technical problems that affect every academic and scientific discipline from chemistry, biology, medicine, and physics to agriculture, business administration, and the fine arts.  The ability to communicate this scientific and technical knowledge to a wide variety of audience with  different technical and scientific backgrounds is an important step towards solving the problems we confront as human beings in complex technological societies.