Blood donation
Our blood donation event takes place against the context of the month dedicated to spreading awareness about blood cancer and those bravely fighting it. Our project has particular relevance when considering how frequently these patients need routine blood transfusions as part of their therapy. It serves as an example of how communication regarding science may close the gap between scientific circles and the general population, showing how group efforts can benefit people in need by providing hope and healing. We were able to have a significant impact because of our partnership with the Red Crescent Society (RCS) of our university.
Since RCS is already experienced in organizing blood transfusions, they gave us contacts of the local Blood Center and helped to organize the event. Around 100 people came and were willing to donate blood. However, only 59 were selected by Blood Center doctors as eligible donors. Nevertheless, overall, we were able to collect around 26.5 liters of blood and collected blood from a single person can save up to 3 lives[1]. All the collected blood was then donated to the cancer patients.
During the event, donors were able to read the brochures on the importance of donating blood, especially for patients who are battling cancer, as well as to read more about the significance of early diagnostics. Symbolically, we organized this event in September - Blood Cancer Awareness Month. Our team received gratitude from donors and Blood Center specialists for organizing the event.
The Media Village Club of our university took from us an interview where one of our members shared our goals and the message that we are trying to translate through this event. We tried to explain that our project, Cellcare, also aims to raise cancer education among the local population. You can find the interview in this link. We hope that after our Blood Donation Day, more people will be able to understand the importance of blood transfusion and raise awareness about cancer treatment.
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Social network
Social media's contribution to information sharing and awareness-building in the current digital era cannot be emphasized. Our team is aware of these platforms' potential as an effective tool for advertising community-oriented events and projects.
Our purposeful use of our Instagram page has helped us reach a larger audience and improve the efficacy of scientific communication. In order to demonstrate the scope of our influence and our dedication to diversity, we launched to honor Pride Month and the accomplishments of women in STEM, introducing current project topics and their significance. We used our social media platform as a marketing tool for the events that were held at the university, such as Blood donation and Summer Camp. Link to the Instagram page
This year, Kazakhstani local media Zakon.kz reached out to our team lead, Anel Umirbaeva, and asked her to give an interview about our project, research, and overall thoughts on science in Kazakhstan. Such media posts with aspiring scientists and scientists, in general, are pretty uncommon locally, making Anel’s interview very informative and helpful for those who have a limited perception of science and the opportunities it offers to youth. You can find the post here:
link to the post
Video lectures
This iGEM season, our team prepared, translated and recorded video lectures for high school students on the topics of biology and synthetic biology in 3 different languages (Kazakh, English, and Russian). These videos were made as part of our previous year's inclusivity project called Remisee and were sent to high schools for students' use. More about video lectures can be found on the Inclusivity page.
Last year, we learned that education should be accessible to everyone. We started by visiting a school gymnasium no. 10 in Astana city with special classes for visually impaired students. We learned the nuances of working with them and talked about the basic concepts of molecular biology, genetics, and synthetic biology. Such lectures helped students perceive the fundamental understanding of life sciences they had never obtained before. That was due to the lack of materials and literature explicitly created for them. Moreover, we visited school No. 4, named after N. Ostrovsky in Almaty city, where we conducted the same lectures and observed the teaching methods, sitting in the classes with students and receiving their feedback afterward. We even filmed an interview with those teachers and students to share it with the public, emphasizing the unequal opportunities and lack of basic materials for education.
Below, you can find a link to the reportages filmed from those two schools (school gymnasium no.10 in Astana city and school no.4 in Almaty city) where students share their experience studying in their schools.
Additionally, we visited a secondary school for students from socially vulnerable categories, BINOM, on their weekly program " Smart Thursday" to give a talk about the wonders of synthetic biology and how high schoolers can also get involved in iGEM
Social network
Social media's contribution to information sharing and awareness-building in the current digital era cannot be emphasized. Our team is aware of these platforms' potential as an effective tool for advertising community-oriented events and projects.
Our purposeful use of our Instagram page has helped us reach a larger audience and improve the efficacy of scientific communication. In order to demonstrate the scope of our influence and our dedication to diversity, we launched to honor Pride Month and the accomplishments of women in STEM, introducing current project topics and their significance. We used our social media platform as a marketing tool for the events that were held at the university, such as Blood donation and Summer Camp. Link to the Instagram page
This year, Kazakhstani local media Zakon.kz reached out to our team lead, Anel Umirbaeva, and asked her to give an interview about our project, research, and overall thoughts on science in Kazakhstan. Such media posts with aspiring scientists and scientists, in general, are pretty uncommon locally, making Anel’s interview very informative and helpful for those who have a limited perception of science and the opportunities it offers to youth. You can find the post here:
link to the post