Research writing course: preparing a text for machine translation

english has been the dominant language in the academic world for many decades. Therefore, second language learners need to develop their academic communication skills, especially academic writing. To improve English language writing skills in higher education, academic writing centers have been established in Russian universities since the 2010s. The Center for Academic Writing «Impulse» at the University of Tyumen provides scaffolding for the development of scholars willing to publish their research internationally. This article describes the course «Preparing a research paper: Machine translation and further editing», held for 16 researchers from October 12 to November 30, 2022. The course was created to address three concerns: difficulty in understanding explanations in English, inappropriate usage of machine translation, and common mistakes. These concerns led to the design of a three-pillar course: language units ranging from low to high complexity, focusing on common mistakes and key aspects; pre- and post-editing stages of machine translation; and Russian as the language of instruction. The course allowed the participants to work with a text through the lens of the machine translation, avoiding some writing mistakes. Sharing this experience can be useful for university faculty and academic writing educators.