Ayça Akal-Strader, Ph.D.
KSA: Ability to Communicate in Writing and Orally
As a scientist, linguist, and a cultural representative of an international student organization, success in my professional career and social life hasbeen heavily basedon my ability to communicate effectively. Being a scientist in mind and a linguist at heart, I always think in terms of direct communication styles and make a conscientious effort to continue to improve myself at all levels of communication. Towards this goal, one of my strongest assets is my ability to listen to, read, and observe other communicators and take notes from this learning process to define the characteristics of a good and poor communicator. Since communication forms the basis of all interactions in life, I put strong emphasis on developing and maintaining good communication skills by using my scientific training, linguistic experiences, and cultural activities.
My scientific career spans over 11 years, including my graduate school and post-graduate level studies. During this period, I have gained extensive experience communicating at a professional level mostly in academia and also in government research institutes. During this period, I have written numerous summary reports, monthly progress reports, biannual committee meeting reports, and e-mail/letter memos. As a research scientist, I have routinely written laboratory experiment protocols, safety protocols, standard operating procedures, and usage and maintenance instructions for complex instruments and laboratory equipment.
Being a research scientist not only requires attending internal, external, national, and international symposia or meetings, but it also requires giving presentations, writing manuscripts and/or grants, as well as teaching. I have attended over 15 meetings and successfully presented my work as an invited speaker at several institutes. As such, I have written several abstracts and manuscripts, including two grant proposals, and edited numerous reports and grant proposals with excellent attention to detail and quality. In addition, I have a strong teaching record, including an excellence in teaching award. As a result, I actively participate in biannual team teaching activities in a course relevant to my scientific field at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Overlapping with my scientific career, I have worked as a linguist for one year in my last role as a managing translator at American Journal Experts (AJE), LLC. As a manager, I trained and supervisedan interdisciplinary group of contract translators. For this, I prepared detailed training manuals and a translation troubleshooting guide, which facilitated speedy training sessions and provided a reference for my staff. At AJE, I also contributed to quarterly news reports regarding the translation team. Finally, I wrote a white paper describing our services and how we can provide help to our international customers.
As a cultural representative of the Turkish Student Organization, I participated in organizing numerous social and cultural events in our university’s intercultural center for which I prepared speeches and update reports. I also organized cultural meetings for the Turkish students in our university and prepared meeting minutes, as well as cultural presentations. On a social level, I reached out to the entire Turkish community in our local district and got them involved in our cultural and social gatherings. In the end, my effective communication skills, dedication, and team building efforts allowed our entire student organization to not only serve the Turkish students and the university campus, but also our local Turkish community as well.
I am currently enrolled in Georgetown University’s English for Heritage Language Speakers (EHLS) program, which is sponsored by the National Security Education Program (NSEP) and focuses on intensive English language for the professional workplace. My program will also require the completion of a bilingual open source analytical research project, as well as the preparation of a report and a presentation. I am confident that by the time I complete my program I will have grown further as a person, professional, and a more effectivebilingual communicator.
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