Paul Morin

My Portfolio

Below you can find samples of my client projects, professional publications, and some recreational writing projects. 

Please note: This portfolio includes only shareable, non-functioning samples; additional client projects remain confidential or proprietary.

Client Projects

A sample of projects and articles I've done for clients or employers

Professional Publications

A selection of my career-oriented published writing

Training Industry •

4 Actions to Increase Engagement Among Learners Who Speak English as a Second Language

Let’s say you’re asked to create a new workplace ethics course for all employees at your company. You’re a few days into the project when you realize that the company has expanded quite a bit since the first workplace ethics course was created, and the term “all employees” now includes the workers at the factory the company assumed control of in Romania and the new satellite office in Istanbul.You ask about the possibility of translating the course into local languages and learn that there’s no...
Digital Doughtnut •

5 Content Tips to Engage Second Language English Speakers

Just because your audience knows English doesn’t mean they know your English. The world’s 1.75 billion English speakers learned all different kinds of it. For many it's their second language. Here are five ways to globalize your marketing content to better engage those second language English speakers.
There are 1.75 billion English speakers on the planet. You’re likely trying to connect with a portion of them.

The thing is this: They speak all different types of English, at all different s...
Medium •

A Strangely Common Grammar Mistake Among Educated Professionals — and the Trick to Avoid It

Open up an Excel spreadsheet, because after you read about this grammar mistake, you’ll want to start keeping track of all the times you hear one of your colleagues make it.You may even feel the urge to correct them. It’s only natural, knowledge is power — Welcome to Grammar Land, Clarice, we’ve been expecting you — and you’ll want detailed notes in case it escalates to that.I noticed it only because of the virus. When your entire day is spent in conferences on phone and video, rather than in pe...
Medium •

Want a Global Readership? Start with Global English

Your articles and blog posts have international reach.That’s obvious — you’re writing on Medium. Further, more than 1.75 billion people speak English worldwide, up and down the streets of cities and towns in every country on every continent of the globe. All kinds of English. Through their cell phones at least, almost all of those 1.75 billion people have access to your writing.I can’t exactly tell you how to get these overseas readers to become your readers. I suppose for that you’ll have to re...
Medium •

Three things good teachers do that bad teachers don’t

If I asked you to name a really good teacher you had at some point in your education, you could probably do it in a heartbeat, without even a second’s hesitation.So we know this much: Good teachers are rare. They really stand out.But if I asked you to name a really bad teacher you had, you could likely do that just as fast. They stand out, too.Have you ever thought about why? In that sea of teaching mediocrity that is your educational background, what precisely made your good teachers good, and...

Personal Perspectives

A sample of my recreational writing

USA TODAY •

Would a Silicon Valley algorithm in a driverless car let you into a line of traffic?

You’re in traffic, and just up ahead on your right there’s a driveway, a McDonald’s exit say, or a gas station on the corner. There’s a car there, and the driver is waiting to come out. Waiting, in other words, for someone to let him into traffic.Normally, you could bestow favor upon him if you chose. You could gesture over your dash, the other driver would wave a thank you (or not) and slowly pull out in front of you. On this occasion there’s one problem: You’re not driving. You’re not even pay...
The Christian Science Monitor •

Beyond burqa bans: US must update laws on face veils

Last semester I went through an experience I'd never gone through before in my teaching career: I taught a student whose face I couldn't see – except for her eyes. The reason? She was from Saudi Arabia, and she was wearing a niqab, a veil that covered her face from the bridge of the nose down.The class was an English as a Second Language speaking course, and Sara (not her real name) was there under the auspices of Saudi Arabia's generous scholarship program for international study. The program a...
Medium •

A Strangely Common Grammar Mistake Among Educated Professionals — and the Trick to Avoid It

Open up an Excel spreadsheet, because after you read about this grammar mistake, you’ll want to start keeping track of all the times you hear one of your colleagues make it.You may even feel the urge to correct them. It’s only natural, knowledge is power — Welcome to Grammar Land, Clarice, we’ve been expecting you — and you’ll want detailed notes in case it escalates to that.I noticed it only because of the virus. When your entire day is spent in conferences on phone and video, rather than in pe...
Medium •

Tolstoy’s Greatest Novel That Never Was

Okay, today’s quiz: Which Tolstoy novel sold the most copies during the author’s lifetime? Was it War and Peace, or Anna Karenina? Or wait, maybe it was that short masterpiece, The Death of Ivan Ilyich?Sorry, the correct answer is Resurrection, Tolstoy’s last novel, first serially published in 1899–1900.I know what you’re thinking: Uhhh . . . it’s called what? Resurrection? By Tolstoy? The Russian? Balding, with a beard?Excellent questions. After all, the man achieved artistic perfection in 1877...
Medium •

Squirrels in Traffic: How I Cracked the Code

One might readily postulate that if squirrels understood the mortal danger of running out into traffic, they wouldn’t do it. Yet squirrels do, repeatedly, run out into traffic, where they often meet their deaths. With such propositions one can only logically conclude that squirrels do not, in fact, understand the danger of running out into traffic.If such is the case, however, then why do squirrels appear to understand the danger of running out into traffic — once, that is, they run out into i...