Program Overview

Policy Brief Writing Course

Overview

The Policy Brief Writing course is designed for bachelor's and master's students who are working on or have recently completed their thesis. The course aims to support participants in using existing research to write short, easy-to-understand policy briefs that can be shared with employers or used as reading content on social media outlets.

Course Objectives

At the end of the course, participants will:

• Have awareness of the modes of dissemination and value of research dissemination
• Understand how to translate research outcomes into policy briefs based on existing master thesis research outcomes
• Understand the key criteria for a good policy brief
• Increase their skill in policy brief writing
• Increase their skill in peer reviewing by providing feedback to other policy briefs
• Understand what dissemination actually can look like after completing the brief

Course Details

• The course is fully online
• The course materials are publicly available on the online learning platform, allowing for self-guided learning
• Instruction-led offerings and tailored offerings are also available
• The course introduces a toolkit that includes instructional materials, examples of policy briefs, and exercises to help translate existing research material into a policy brief format

Course Structure

The course includes:

• Instructional materials (instruction videos, readings, format templates)
• Examples of policy briefs highlighting good and bad elements
• Link to repositories that disseminate research outcomes to policymakers
• Exercises to help translate existing research material into a policy brief format
• Exercises to encourage students to define the target audience and create a dissemination strategy for the policy brief

Instructors

• Dr. Mindel van de Laar, Associate Professor and Head of the Capacity Development Office at UNU-MERIT

Course Type and Cost

• The course is online
• Thanks to support from the VIS program, a limited number of tuition-free places are available in this virtual exchange course