The American Society for Microbiology (ASM) is developing and disseminating an electronic collection of peer-reviewed teaching and learning resources for biology education specifically centered on the microbial world. The primary purpose of the electronic collection is to establish a national center of microbiological resources for teaching and learning. This electronic collection of peer-reviewed educational resources for the undergraduate teaching community is analogous to an electronic journal of peer-reviewed science articles for the research community. The collection has two, unique features: 1) All items included in the collection are correlated to key microbial concepts and basic laboratory skills for undergraduate education; and 2) All items are peer-reviewed and selected for scientific accuracy, educational quality and visual presentation. Entries range from the basic sciences to engineering, environmental sciences, medicine and public health, public policy, and business. Curriculum development teams connect the national collection of microbial resources to the World Wide Web (WWW) and correlate these resources to key microbial concepts and basic laboratory skills. The development teams identify the resources and link the tremendous collection of educational resources to key microbial concepts and basic laboratory skills. The collection is updated and augmented regularly. It can be transported easily into a variety of learning environments both nationally and internationally. The collection is a model for other national organizations in science, mathematics, engineering and technology and contains specific information related to the preparation of teachers well prepared to introduce microbial concepts into their classes.
