With this project, the Dolan DNA Learning Center (DNALC) of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), in collaboration with community college faculty and the National Advanced Technological Education Center for Biotechnology (Bio-Link) is establishing a professional development program to disseminate instructional modules that provide a strong foundation for biotechnology careers in the genome age. The program focuses on four key technologies: polymerase chain reaction (PCR), DNA sequencing, RNA interference (RNAi), and bioinformatics. It encompasses three eukaryotic systems: humans, plants, and nematode worms. Each module can be integrated into existing courses, provide the basis for new courses, or serve as the foundation for student research projects.
Intellectual Merit: The post-genome era demands biotechnicians equipped with the tools and intellect needed to tap the enormous potential hidden within complex and dynamic eukaryotic genomes. The intellectual merit of this proposal lies in the fact it brings a new perspective to the field, a cost effective eukaryote based approach to high school and undergraduate laboratories in genomics. The evaluation plan, involving faculty and doctoral students at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, has merits both for the project itself and for the model it establishes for teasing out the outcomes of faculty development efforts as regards subsequent faculty activity and the resultant student outcomes.
Broader Impacts: A strong community college perspective, including best practices for program development and industry collaborations, complements the experimental program. Over its three-year term, the program will reach 288 biotechnology faculty at week-long workshops conducted at 12 community colleges nationwide. A leadership cadre of 12 community college advisors is involved in all aspects of the program: determining workshop curriculum, hosting and co-teaching workshops, providing participant follow-up support, evaluating the program impact in the classroom, and disseminating the project. Additional expert advisors are drawn from the biotechnology industry, high schools, and 4-year colleges. Broad classroom implementation is supported by the Internet sites built for each teaching module, the custom bioinformatics tools developed, the teaching kits available from various suppliers, and a laboratory text, Genome Science, to be published by CSHL Press.
