Team:Calgary/Public Engagement
PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT
The iGEM 2018 Calgary team focused our outreach and education efforts on targeting three tiers of stakeholders involved in the project: researchers, students, and the general public. .
Researchers
Faculty Talk
In May of 2018, our team held a informational presentation outlining our preliminary ideas and plans for researchers, doctors, and general interest groups at the University of Calgary. Our team used this time as an opportunity to connect with the individuals who are most likely to utilize our system in the future and listen to feedback surrounding our project. More about the feedback we received during this meeting can be found in the Integrated Human Practices page. One of our other dominant purposes of holding this information session was to educate researchers and professionals about our future plans regarding this system. We held this talk early in the summer to increase awareness and relevance of our project. A common theme we encountered in our early human practices discussions included concerns about the ethics and connotations surrounding a “gene therapy” project. We wanted to make sure that we had reached out properly to the target users of our system and addressed these concerns directly.
Students
International Baccalaureate Curriculum
In an effort to engage with aspiring scientists worldwide, our team sought to create a new synthetic biology addition to the International Baccalaureate Organization program. The IB Biology Higher Level curriculum contains a variety of “optional studies,” where students are able to choose which topic to write on for their exam. Our team planned to create a novel “synthetic biology” option for high school IB students. We drafted a rough outline of the contents of a synthetic biology option, which we brought to discuss with IB teachers at Father Lacombe High School and Western Canada High School. .
However, after meeting with Mr. Norman Hounjet (IB Coordinator), Mrs. Marija Susnjar (IB Coordinator), and Ms. Anna Majczak (IB Biology teacher) at Father Lacombe High School and Susan Rivers (IB Coordinator) at Western Canada High School, we were informed that the IB Organization had already passed their period of public corroboration for their upcoming curriculum change. Regardless, we have included our preliminary plans for a curriculum component here and we urge any high schools with flexibility in their curriculums to integrate synthetic biology concepts into their learning.
High School Lesson Plan
A common theme heard throughout meetings with Father Lacombe High School Teachers and Western Canada High School was that teachers would be more willing to integrate single-class lesson plans into their regular curriculum rather than an entire curriculum change. Taking this feedback, our team designed a lesson plan for a “Synthetic Biology 101” lesson, including a powerpoint on introductory synthetic biology and common laboratory techniques, as well as a strawberry DNA extraction activity.
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General Public
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