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Team:Macquarie Australia/HumanOutreach
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| - | + | In order to connect our project with the wider community and to support iGEM's goal of fostering scientific education, our team has decided to develop a seminar which can be presented to secondary students which explores the concept of synthetic biology and examines the ethics and safety issues which are involved. This seminar would ideally be presented to year 12 biology students (as it complements the NSW High School Certificate Biology curriculum); however, we aim to make it accessible to the majority of secondary students. | |
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| + | We have decided to focus primarily on the ethical and safety issues surrounding synthetic biology; in particular, we will describe the laboratory safety precautions we need to take, the ethical considerations of our project and the way that these issues reflect universal human practice in the synthetic biology industry. We will seek to relate these concepts to the students' experience of scientific practice. | ||
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| + | Students will be surveyed before and after the seminar. The survey at the beginning of the session will help students to engage with the content as well as determining how much they know. The survey at the end of the session will help students consolidate what they have learnt as well as allowing us to assess how effective the seminar has been. This is particularly important as it is the first time that a Macquarie team has attempted anything like this, and it will be essential to critically reflect upon the success of the seminar. | ||
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| + | The seminar itself will involve a brief description of what synthetic biology is, an outline of iGEM and what the Macquarie project is, an overview of the ethical issues surrounding synthetic biology in general, and a more detailed look at some case studies and how the issues that they raise have been dealt with. | ||
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| + | Following the seminar, we will facilitate a discussion amongst students in which they will work in collaborative groups to identify and discuss the ethical issues surrounding a specific issue of current relevance to our society. This will enable them to extend their knowledge and engage with the concepts they have been hearing about in a real-world context. | ||
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Revision as of 04:56, 14 August 2012
In order to connect our project with the wider community and to support iGEM's goal of fostering scientific education, our team has decided to develop a seminar which can be presented to secondary students which explores the concept of synthetic biology and examines the ethics and safety issues which are involved. This seminar would ideally be presented to year 12 biology students (as it complements the NSW High School Certificate Biology curriculum); however, we aim to make it accessible to the majority of secondary students.
We have decided to focus primarily on the ethical and safety issues surrounding synthetic biology; in particular, we will describe the laboratory safety precautions we need to take, the ethical considerations of our project and the way that these issues reflect universal human practice in the synthetic biology industry. We will seek to relate these concepts to the students' experience of scientific practice.
Students will be surveyed before and after the seminar. The survey at the beginning of the session will help students to engage with the content as well as determining how much they know. The survey at the end of the session will help students consolidate what they have learnt as well as allowing us to assess how effective the seminar has been. This is particularly important as it is the first time that a Macquarie team has attempted anything like this, and it will be essential to critically reflect upon the success of the seminar.
The seminar itself will involve a brief description of what synthetic biology is, an outline of iGEM and what the Macquarie project is, an overview of the ethical issues surrounding synthetic biology in general, and a more detailed look at some case studies and how the issues that they raise have been dealt with.
Following the seminar, we will facilitate a discussion amongst students in which they will work in collaborative groups to identify and discuss the ethical issues surrounding a specific issue of current relevance to our society. This will enable them to extend their knowledge and engage with the concepts they have been hearing about in a real-world context.
