Team:ETH Zurich/labblog/20141014hum

High School Students

Tuesday, October 14th

On Oct 14 2014 Stefanie and Nadine visited a high school in Bern as a part of our human practice project. The girls had the chance to teach students at the age of 16-17 years. Through these lectures, we attempted to impart the basic principles of synthetic biology and encouraged the students to participate in a discussion of the concepts presented. In these discussions we tried to focus on risks to humans, health, the environment and the public. The structure of the lessons was really open for personal inputs from the side of the students. The topics discussed ranged from whether you should or should not express GFP in other organisms (the question of freewill came up), animal trials in research, GMO's in general to the production of artificial meat in bioreactors.

Furthermore former iGEM projects were quickly outlined and their possibilities and potential discussed. Thus, we increased the level of awareness of synthetic biology and simultaneously teach the students how to approach complex problems. Another aspect of our visit was to promote the studies of science in general. The students were encouraged to ask all questions that came to their minds. This school visit belongs to the outreach aspect of our human practice project as it aims to share knowledge with the public.