An Undergraduate Course on Publishing in Neuroscience

While scientific publishing is not typically taught to undergraduate students, we believe that an in-depth exposure to this topic might prove useful to those contemplating careers in neuroscience research or scientific writing and publishing. Here we describe a course designed to introduce students to most aspects of online publishing, from the details of editing to the ethics of scientific communication, from the specifics of how an online website works to the general debate between open-access and for-profit publishing. By having students learn about the theoretical issues in refereeing while actually reviewing submissions for the journal IMPULSE, the students gain practical knowledge about scientific publishing, a deeper understanding of the contemporary research environment, and intellectual confidence.