Education

In the state of Virginia, many undergraduates come to university from a variety of different backgrounds including public, private, and homeschooling which naturally teach a different curriculum. Public schools are required to teach specified curriculums and topics; In Virginia, state mandated public school curriculum includes some synthetic biology lessons and past iGEM teams have contributed to add synthetic biology questions on gene expression, genetic engineering, and ethics to the state exams (Science Standards of Learning or SOLs) [1].

Homeschooling, which is the act of educating one’s children at home, has different standards. Homeschooled students in Virginia do not have to adhere to these same requirements. Though some homeschooled students take SOLs, the majority do not, and parents submit a curriculum plan to the state for approval [2].

Homeschooling can be beneficial as parents often choose this option to give their child a more personalized, flexible education with a greater emphasis on the subjects their child is most interested in learning. Homeschooling also became increasingly popular in response to the remote education model adopted by most schools during the COVID19 pandemic, as parents preferred their children to learn face-to-face. In fact, since 2019, the number of homeschooled children in America has grown by almost 1.5 million [3]. In 2022, in Virginia alone, over 60,000 of its students were homeschooled: around 5% of all school-age children in the state [4].

Given the prevalence of homeschoolers in Virginia and the lack of required synthetic biology learning, our team decided to investigate available synthetic biology resources for this community. We found that despite its prevalence, most homeschoolers are self-funded and thus lack the resources that traditional schools have.

After talking to a Virginian homeschool educator, Mrs. Eleanor Nicholson, we learned that there is also a lack of free and in-depth science materials for students. We also consulted Mrs. Sudhita Kasturi, a homeschool educator with a background in Chemistry and Biology, who informed us there is an urgent need for more accurate biology resources with interactive questions and activities. To read more about our interview go to Human Practices. Thus, we decided to create a synthetic biology educational handbook with the intent of supplementing available resources for the homeschool community. One of the great strengths of homeschooling is how students can work together with their parents to pursue what they’re truly passionate about, and we want to make it easier to do so. Our handbook is targeted towards homeschooled high schoolers and advanced middle schoolers though we hope that by making it available online it can become an accessible resource for students looking to learn more about synthetic biology.

After creating the handbook, we received helpful feedback from Mrs. Kasturi as she has a biology and teaching background. From her feedback we added more interactive questions weaved throughout the handbook and rearranged the teaching guide for clarity. We then conducted an Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved survey to gather feedback on our handbook from the target audience. The IRB regulates and reviews all non-medical behavior human research at the University of Virginia. The survey was distributed to parents of children aged 11-17 in the homeschool and public-school communities and parent educators. The survey asked questions regarding background knowledge, what activities they liked or disliked in the handbook, whether the information was presented in a clear and thoughtful manner, and if they would recommend the book to others interested in learning synthetic biology, as well as many other questions for feedback.

Sample responses to “What did you like about the handbook?”

The most important results used to update our handbook are presented in the graphs below:

We distributed our handbook by directly contacting over 10 homeschooling organizations in Virginia. We also made our handbook available free online for public access via social media and our website.

Though the development of our handbook is a step in the right direction to increasing accessibility to synthetic biology learning materials, there is still a severe lack of STEM access for the homeschool community due to the cost of equipment and lab space. Our goal is to help alleviate these disparities, and we hope future VGEM teams can come up with plans to alleviate these costs.

The UVA Engineering Summer Bridge Program is hosted by UVA’s Center for Diversity in Engineering to ease the transition into college for underrepresented incoming engineering students. These students may not have had as many opportunities to get involved in STEM activities and niche interests such as synthetic biology in high school. They also may need additional help with finding research opportunities now that they are in college, which is why on July 19, several of our team members gave a presentation to Bridge program participants on how to get involved with synthetic biology and research at UVA. We discussed our iGEM project for this year and encouraged them to apply in the fall semester to be part of next year’s team!