Overview
Team RoSynth organized and hosted various educational events for students and community members. We emphasized the importance of a two-way dialogue and obtaining feedback from students, which we incorporated into our lesson plans. Our team worked to adapt material for our diverse students, working with over 180 students in all. All our education lesson plans, worksheets, and curriculum design guide are downloadable and adaptable for different ages and backgrounds. RoSynth hopes to make synthetic biology education fun and accessible for everyone.
Curriculum Design Guide
To help future educators in synthetic biology and other subjects, team RoSynth created a curriculum design guide for designing inclusive and accessible lesson activities. Through exploring national educational standards for science education, team RoSynth delves into ways synthetic biology can be incorporated into education for middle and high school students. The team has given the curriculum design guide to Rochester Charter Academy middle school, with plans to incorporate lessons during their science classes.
Expert Insights
To improve our educational events and practices, we met with several experts throughout the project to discuss improvements. In the early stages of designing activities and for our Upward Bound plans, we met with Dr. Nicholas Hammond, an expert in peer-led team learning, to review our educational goals and lessons. To gain more insight on science communication, we talked with Dr. Shane Campbell-Staton, host of the podcast “The Biology of Superheroes” and PBS show “Human Footprints,” to hear his approach to communication of his research. We met with Dr. Korfmacher, professor of environmental medicine, to discuss ways to pitch our project to the general public.
Meeting with Dr. Shane Campbell-Staton
About Dr. Shane Campbell-Staton
Dr. Shane Campbell-Staton is an evolutionary biologist and assistant professor at Princeton University; he completed his BSc at the University of Rochester and PhD at Harvard University. He has his own podcast “The Biology of Superheroes'' and his own PBS show “Human Footprints.” His research focuses on the effects of urbanization, invasive species, climate change, and other human-related changes on wild populations of a wide range of species including tuskless elephants from Mozambique, wolves from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, urban lizards from Puerto Rico, and alligators in Florida. He specializes in the intersection of academia communication and storytelling - specifically exploring superheroes as an avenue to introduce new topics to audiences that are new to the conversation.
“Don’t underestimate your audience’s intellect, and don’t overestimate their knowledge.”
“Find a genuine point of connection with your audience”
The purpose of meeting with Dr. Campbell-Staton was to gain insight on how to improve our own outreach efforts to communicate our research to the general public. His experience showed us the importance of using stories in communication. He emphasized how science communications needs us to give a part of ourselves to the audience in a genuine way. We need to find our own niche that makes our project special. Realizing that research does not often provide clear conclusions or “morals to the story”, the public need to appropriately consult various sources before making their own decisions on how to navigate the world. Dr. Campbell-Staton reminded us that it’s important to get conversations about these topics started, and taking advantage of intersecting interests as a way to make science communication more accessible is a great method. We conducted this meeting on June 23rd.
For our future education events, we will aim to use more of a storytelling approach. When opening up events, we will use more relatable questions to get the audience to care about our topic. For example, we can first talk about gardening, or growing rosemary and related plants before diving into our research. We could also discuss our personal experiences with herbal medicines. These moments of vulnerability can show the humanity in science and demonstrate the importance of plant-derived molecules.
Meeting with Dr. Korfmacher
About Dr. Katrina Smith Korfmacher
Dr. Korfmacher is a professor of Environmental Medicine and has participated in many local partnerships in environmental medicine including the Coalition to Prevent Lead Poisoning. As a policy scientist, she has experience translating her research into relevant policies at the local, state, and federal levels.
Through the meeting we gained valuable insights on how to make our argument more compelling, and pitch our research to the general public. She suggested backing up our arguments with numbers to show that our synthesis technique is more efficient, more cost effective, and more environmentally friendly than the normal way of getting rosmarinic acid, which is extraction from plants. Since our project’s focus is on the technique and not the specific product of rosmarinic acid, we could also look into other rare or environmentally harmful plant derivatives to emphasize the application of our technique. She also suggested a great resource of science kits called Science Take-out where we could get inspiration for our education events.
Going forward, we need to work more on pitching our project with an emphasis on its applications instead of rosmarinic acid. We will also be looking into other applications of our technology. For education events, she reinforced the idea that hands-on activities are one of the best ways to keep students engaged and to simplify challenging concepts. We will take inspiration from Science Take-out to modify our activities.
Meeting with Dr. Nicholas Hammond
About Dr. Nicholas Hammond
Dr. Hammond is the Director for Workshops in the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) at the University of Rochester. He teaches courses in pedagogy in support of UR's implementation of the Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL) model across the College of Arts, Sciences & Engineering. He has a background in lab bench chemistry for his Ph. D., and has worked with higher-ed in Chemistry for his postdoc, both of which make him an invaluable resource for improving our Education & Outreach programs.
“You never know something until you’ve messed it up”
Upward Bound is a federally-funded program which supports high school students who may become first-generation college students and/or low-income students according to federal guidelines. Team RoSynth was preparing for a workshop with Upward Bound on July 17th. Thus, we believed it would be helpful to hear from field experts like Dr. Hammond in education with a STEM background so that we could receive valuable course design feedback and refine our lesson design to create better learning experiences for high school students in the program.
Overall, Dr. Hammond said that the course plan which we presented to him was good, however he noted a few issues for us to consider and address:
Better Learning (Callback Learning Method)
He suggested that we provide some science facts and figures that are conceptually wrong and give time for students to correct them. He urged us to let students start “the conversation” instead of telling them the concepts directly. For example, he said that we could let students guess how the name of the DNA relates with its structure instead of telling them the full name of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) directly, making participants more engaged and enabling deep learning. This will help them utilize various methods of learning instead of pure memorization of an acronym.
Better Time Control for the Lesson
To ensure better time management during our lesson, Dr. Hammond suggested that we run in-class experiments in advance to determine how much time is required for each, and that we prepare the experimental kit on each station before the class starts, as it takes time to distribute tools and materials. Given we only have 1 hour and 15 minutes with the students, it is necessary to simplify the materials for quick & easy understanding.
Better Course Engagement (Create a Real Life Story)
Dr. Hammond also recommended that we create a “learning purpose” for each planned activity that relates to real life. For example, the part of our lesson in which we direct participants to decode the amino acid sequence of proteins might be difficult for our audience. Instead, we could pick the part of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein (which is targeted by COVID-19 vaccines) and make participants play the role of a lab technician that is working to decoding a short spike protein sequence to create an mRNA vaccine. Making students take on a real-life role in the lesson and giving them background on how the activity is used in the world can increase their engagement with the topic more than if they had simply decoded the sequence without this context.
Additionally, after students finish their strawberry DNA extraction, Dr. Hammond told us that we should use this experiment to encourage them to continue exploring biology by telling them that they can continue doing exciting DNA extraction experiments in the University of Rochester labs by pursuing higher education!
Environmental Considerations (Biocontainment of the Experimental Disposal)
Dr. Hammond also noted that we should also come up with a plan for proper disposal of all the materials (including strawberries) that we’re using for the experiments to prevent contamination for the environment.
We should leave time in our Upward Bound lesson for interactive questions, and attempt to increase the engagement of participants by implementing some of the techniques that Dr. Hammond described in our meeting. We should also ensure there is enough time allotted for each portion of the lesson, and make a disposal plan for the laboratory materials being used in order to prevent environmental contamination.
Education & Outreach Events
Memorial Art Gallery
We were invited to present at The Rochester Forum which took place on June 2nd at the Memorial Art Gallery. This event was organized by the Lifelong Learning Advisory Council (LiLAC) and Office of Alumni Relations. This was an amazing opportunity to share our research with alumni of the university in the age range of 50s - 70s.
Rochester Forum MAG Presentation
Our goal for the Rochester Forum was to teach and help our audience understand synthetic biology and our project of synthesizing plant-derived chemicals using yeast and bacteria to an audience curious about research. We wanted to share our novel research with an older audience to start conversations about synthetic biology. Everyone there was an alumni from the University, with a variety of backgrounds in business, law, and science. Since our audience all had at least an undergraduate level of education, we adapted our presentation language to be appropriate for an audience with a higher education but not necessarily a science background.
The event was successful with a large attendance of around 80 people. Many people were intrigued by our project and asked how we came up with our idea. The audience asked many questions about the science of our project and more people were interested in the business aspect of our project than we expected. We had some audience members asking about patents and what categories our product would fall under. They were also interested in the science behind the project, and how we would prevent our strains from mutating.
We got mostly verbal feedback with some written feedback. People were really interested in our project and iGEM as a whole. They were surprised we were doing a whole project in such a short time period and were curious how we came up with our project idea.
Based on the feedback, for future presentations we will include more about the other aspects of our project such as business plans and outreach efforts. Our presentations will be more in depth about the science behind our project and ethical considerations.
Highlands at Pittsford Senior Home
We presented our project at the Highlands at Pittsford, which is a senior residential center located in Pittsford, NY. At our presentation at the Rochester Forum, many seniors loved learning about new research that students are doing, so we wanted to share our project and teach synthetic biology to more people from a similar age category. We planned a presentation with interactive questions and left time for the audience to ask questions.
Highlands at Pittsford Senior Home Presentation
We had presented before to a similar audience age category at the Rochester Forum, and we wanted to apply the feedback we had received to the Rochester Forum to Highlands. Our goals for the event were to communicate our project background and goals, facilitate discussion on how synthetic biology is impactful, and encourage the audience to stay engaged with the presentation. Since our audience were in the older age category and likely had varied knowledge of synthetic biology, we set simple learning objectives of understanding the purpose of using yeast and bacteria in our synthesis pathway and explaining the use of hydrogels. We made our presentation suitable for an older audience by using larger fonts, clear words, and pictures. In response to our Rochester forum, we wanted to create a more engaging presentation by asking questions throughout. We used real-world analogies for our content such as comparing hydrogels to Jell-O, and created simple diagrams to depict the pathway we used. From our previous experience at the Rochester Forum, the audience were really interested in the business aspect of our project, so this time we made sure to include a few slides for explaining Policy & Practice efforts.
The event went well, we had a large turnout of 18-19 residents who were really engaged with our presentation.
When we asked the preliminary questions, several seniors raised their fingers to answer. When we asked which of the plants on the screen do they think contain rosmarinic acid, one person said “all of them” which was correct. Many seniors were very interested in the design of our printer and asked several questions regarding how molecules diffuse between the hydrogels. They were curious to see the progress of our work. For future presentations, it would be nice to put up pictures of our work in the lab so the audience can visually see the hydrogels and bacteria we are working with.
Many audience members came up to talk to us after the presentation, asking about what year we were and what made us choose the project. They invited us back to present after the Jamboree to hear about our progress and results, which we are coordinating for November. Our written feedback had suggestions that we could speak louder and clearer, which we will remember to do for future outreach events. Some audience members who weren’t scientists had some trouble understanding our project. Our slides on the theory behind our wet-lab could have been simpler for the audience. We also had a person ask how our process can be scaled up the manufacturing levels on the feedback form we gave at the end of the presentation.
Based on the feedback, for future outreach events we can simplify the concepts of our experiments even more for a non-science audience. One way we will address this in future lessons is to first outline any relevant background information when speaking to a non-scientific audience. We will continue to ask preliminary questions that keep the audience actively engaged with the presentation.
Upward Bound
Upward Bound is a federally-funded program that supports high school students that are potential first-generation college students and/or low-income according to federal guidelines. The goal of the program is to introduce Rochester City School students to biology laboratory techniques. We held a workshop on July 17th in a teaching lab on campus, where we taught the students how to streak plates of bacteria/yeast colonies and construct BioBricks.
Designing BioBricks
The learning objectives for this event were to have students apply their knowledge of BioBrick construction through the activity of making a BioBrick bracelet using beads to represent the different genetic components and demonstrate their ability to streak bacteria on plates. The students were all high schoolers ranging from freshmen to seniors with more students being seniors. As we talked about concepts we worked to gauge their current knowledge by asking if they had learned about how DNA is used to make RNA, RNA to make proteins, and gene expression in school. After gauging their knowledge, we tailored the activity to their experience level by explaining different terms and using analogies to give them enough information before explaining synthetic biology.
We started off the workshop with a demonstration on how to streak plates of bacteria, and allowed the students to practice on their own plates. Then, we transitioned to a short presentation on synthetic biology and how to make BioBricks with different functions. Using beads to represent the different components of BioBricks, we had students construct their own “BioBrick” bracelet. All the students were very collaborative and stayed engaged during the activities. During the bracelet activity, we played some music which helped the kids relax a bit. Overall, the students really enjoyed the activities of streaking plates and creating bead bracelets.
From observations, it was obvious the students weren’t fully engaged during the presentation part of the workshop. They were much more absorbed in the hands-on activity, and particularly enjoyed streaking the plates. From written feedback, the students loved the creativity of making bead bracelets to apply their learning of BioBrick structure. Some students gave the feedback that they didn’t understand the concepts, meaning we could have included some more background info in the beginning of the presentation to help them understand. One student even commented that they wanted to learn more about the fluorescent gene and how it’s used in research.
Based on the feedback, improvements will be made that are better tailored to the audience’s age and knowledge. Having some preliminary questions at the beginning of the presentation would be a good way to understand what concepts need to be broken down in simpler terms. This would also be a good opportunity for them to ask questions about any concepts they have questions on.
Knowing that students aren’t as engaged in the presentation, in future lessons we will minimize the presentation length, and focus on active learning. Students also weren’t as engaged when we interspersed the lessons in between activities. Finishing all of the presentation before moving on to the activity would be better.
We ran out of time at the end, so one idea for next time is to do a trial run of the workshop to figure out timing. We were able to get through all the activities but not all of the presentation.
In the future, we will be more organized at the start of workshops. Also, creating a more supportive environment by talking to individual students and sharing more about ourselves would help us better connect with the students.
Since some students finish activities quicker than others, for future workshops, to prevent too much sitting and waiting, we can prepare some smaller additional activities or spend some time talking with students and getting to know them.
Rochester Museum and Science Center Curiosity Camps
The team came in on two days each week at the Rochester Museum and Science Center (RMSC) to lead a lesson with the Med School 101 summer camp. We worked with around 40 students ranging from 9-11 years old and had an interest in biology across two weeks. We had the same lessons but different students each week, therefore we could make improvements based on the feedback from the first week and apply them to the activities during the second week.
| Day | Topic | Description | Materials | Activity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Day 1 | Genetic Engineering Medicines | Students were introduced to synthetic biology and how different genes can be inserted into plasmids using restriction enzymes. | Genetic Engineering Slides | Genetic Engineering Worksheet |
| Day 2 | DNA Structure and Bile | Students learned about the structure of DNA, the steps of extracting DNA from strawberries, and how bile breaks down fats. | Strawberry DNA Activity Slides Strawberry DNA Lesson Plan Bile Digestion Slides |
Strawberry DNA Extraction worksheet Bile Milk worksheet |
The camp had a theme of Med School 101, so we wanted to keep activities as closely related to the theme as possible but still incorporate synthetic biology.
Our overall goal was for students to understand the role of synthetic biology in the real world. We planned three different activities for RMSC. The first activity called “Genetic Engineering Medicines” introduced students to synthetic biology and how different genes can be inserted into plasmids using restriction enzymes. We used the backward design model and action verbs from Bloom’s Taxonomy for the brainstorming of Genetic Engineering Medicines. For the Strawberry DNA activity, we talked about the structure of DNA and led students through the steps of extracting DNA from strawberries, explaining the purpose of each step. We drew from the engagement aspects of the Universal Design of Learning to design both the strawberry DNA and bile milk activity. The Bile Milk activity had food dye in a bowl of milk, and when students used a stick with soap and touched the milk, the dye would swirl, representing fat and bile.
Our learning objectives for the Genetic Engineering Medicines activity were:
- Learn about the process of genetic engineering.
- Apply knowledge of genetic engineering to synthesizing medicines.
- Implement the steps of inserting a gene with desired function into a bacteria.
Our learning objectives for the Strawberry DNA extraction activity were:
- Describe the structure of DNA.
- Identify and perform the steps of DNA extraction
Our learning objective for the Bile Milk Activity:
- Model how bile from the liver digests fat as it enters the small intestine.
Week 1: The students were very engaged and enthusiastic about the concepts we talked about. Before we started our lesson we gauged their knowledge by asking “what is DNA? What are genes?” Students actively responded with some saying “Deoxyribonucleic acid” and others “they make up our hair and eye color and are passed down from parents.” During the genetically engineering medicines activity, they loved the example of using the GFP protein from jellyfish and inserting it into cats. We also asked them to come up with ideas of genes that would be useful to have. Some responses included “breathing underwater, smelling nice, turning orange”. The worksheet with plasmids was a bit too complicated and confusing for the students, and thus they weren’t interested in working through and writing answers on the worksheet. The Bile milk activity and strawberry DNA extraction were popular among the kids, since it was hands-on. Many kids had trouble seeing the DNA since some kids couldn’t properly filter the strawberries. Again, the worksheets were largely ignored even when we gave specific instructions, which made me rework the worksheets for the following week.
Week 2: The students were quieter this week, but still actively engaged with our activities. One kid asked “I thought all bacteria were bad for you?” which prompted a conversation about how using bacteria safely and science could help people. Originally in week 1, there were letters on the plasmid and gene segment in the engineering medicines activity for the students to match up, but they got a bit confused, so we changed the plasmid and gene segments to be sticky ends that aligned perfectly. Once the plasmid worksheet was simplified, many more students understood and completed the activity. Since the students weren’t fully engaged with the worksheet, we turned all the information from the worksheet into short powerpoints that we went through before the activity. This was a much effective way to get the kids staying engaged with the concepts. Students were actively asking questions and answering what they knew about DNA.
After realizing that the kids didn’t enjoy writing, we turned our feedback form into verbal feedback. We asked them to raise their hands if they enjoyed the activities, and we had an even split between students who enjoyed each activity. When we asked them for one thing they learned, some responses were “strawberries have DNA” and “oil is split by bile.” We also asked what other topics they wished we had covered and some included “chromatography, viruses, elephant toothpaste, and how DNA can dissolve.” I had one student ask if it was possible to insert strawberry scent DNA into humans.
Many kids successfully taped the plasmids together and wrote the gene they wanted to insert on the plasmid, demonstrating understanding of the gene being incorporated into the plasmid. Kids taped the plasmid on their bacteria to represent the bacteria uptaking the plasmid.
Based on the first week, some improvements made to the second week of activities included simplifying the engineering medicines worksheet. For future workshops, I think limiting text-based and writing for this age group and focusing more on the oral engagement with leaving opportunities for questions would help with the two-way dialogue and facilitate learning.
Westside Farmers Market
We had our own booth at the Westside Farmers market on July 25th to display our project via posters and brochures. The farmers market gave us the opportunity to talk to a diverse audience with varying educational backgrounds. We showed our posters, brochures, and engaged with children through a bracelet activity. We had two tables, one for our poster and brochures, and one with a BioBrick bracelet activity for kids who came to the market.
Our overall goals for the farmers market were:
- Present basic synthetic biology at varying levels to a diverse audience.
- Demonstrate how to construct a BioBrick with beads analogy.
- Explain the role of DNA in expressing new functions
- Describe how genes can be transformed into organisms to confer novel functions.
- Apply concepts of genetic engineering by constructing a “BioBrick” with with different parts for expression.
The event was affected by the weather. For most of the time during the market, it was pouring heavily with thunder, which resulted in fewer visitors at the market. We weren’t able to talk to as many people as we hoped, but we still had some great conversations with visitors and other vendors.
One of the main points of feedback we received was to simplify our poster and explanation of our project. The person in the booth next to ours with a finance background asked about our “value proposition” after learning about our project. A value proposition is the benefits that a company promises to deliver to current and future customers who will buy their products and services. At the moment, we didn’t have a good value proposition prepared for someone not in the field of science, but the feedback emphasized the importance of having a proposition for the general public.
Based on our feedback, presenting a clearer poster and explanation of our project would connect easier with an audience with a non-science background. Also developing a value proposition would emphasize our impact and importance of the project to the general public.
Brighton Farmers Market
After the Westside Farmers market, we decided to do outreach at the Brightons Farmers Market “Ask a Scientist” booth. After reflection from our previous experience at a farmers market, we wanted to make improvements to the way we presented our project to the general public. We had a poster set up with brochures and business cards on the table. We also created a short slideshow with pictures of team members working in the lab, which provided some visual aids when explaining different concepts.
The goal for organizing the booth was to educate the public about how our project utilizes synthetic biology to create useful chemicals.
Our learning objectives were:
- Describe how genes can be transformed into organisms to confer novel functions.
- Describe how yeast and bacteria can work together in a synthesis pathway.
The weather was much better at the farmers market compared to Westside, which meant more people were present at the market. Having a fox mascot at our table helped attract families over to our booth. This was a large improvement from the Westside farmers market. We were able to talk to more people, and our choice of wearing lab coats helped to let people know that this was the “ask a scientist” booth. We were able to talk to a broad range of people with varying backgrounds, even a microbiology professor and an expert in the American chestnut tree. Many people took our brochures and business cards, telling us they would love to learn more about our project.
We got most of our feedback from conversations with people. We noticed that most people who stopped by couldn’t stay long, so it probably would be nice to bring physical displays of our work such as printer parts to attract their attention. We also had some people tell us they weren’t fully sure what our booth was, but noticed our lab coats and posters and were intrigued. Next time, we could also include some interactive activity to help people coming to our booth to be more engaged. People who stopped by our poster asked about how we put genes into organisms, and why we specifically chose rosmarinic acid. People who had a background in science asked about our 3D printer and our use of hydrogels.
Based on our feedback, some improvements to be made to our outreach efforts include preparing a larger range of educational and interesting materials to engage a broader audience. It also would have been better to have a sign for people passing by to identify our booth. Coming up with a better way to get feedback from the farmer’s market would also better facilitate feedback. For example, after conversations with different people, asking if they have suggestions for us would help improve our science communication.
Conclusions
Team RoSynth worked with over 180 students and community members throughout our project. We talked with many experts to improve our pedagogical frameworks and craft our own curriculum design guide. Throughout all our events, we strived to make learning science fun and accessible to all.
- Broas, S. (2023). BioBrick Building Workshop.
- Ferrell, B. (2023, May 8). Anatomy experiments: Digestion. Half a Hundred Acre Wood. https://www.halfahundredacrewood.com/anatomy-experiments-digestion/.
- Strawberry DNA extraction activity. Institute for Molecular Bioscience - University of Queensland. (2020, August 10). https://imb.uq.edu.au/strawberry-dna-extraction-activity.
- Saptasense- Outreach & Education. Saptasense | Rochester - iGEM 2022. (n.d.). https://2022.igem.wiki/rochester/.