The students sit quietly at their desks, listening to their professor lecture on the basics of yeast "meiosis" and chromosomes. Every now and then a yawn escapes, and a student gazes momentarily out the window of the Sacramento City College classroom.
This sounds like a typical summer genetics class, but these students are different, a fact that becomes obvious when you hear their discussion.
"I like to use different kinds of beans to show gene segregation, so one can physically separate the chromosomes," says one student, who looks to be about 40. Other students nod in approval. "I like to use pieces of paper to represent chromosomes. After about three explanations, they get it," another chimes in.
These 12 students are high-school and middle-school biology teachers selected to take part in the Biology Institute, a joint UC Davis-Sacramento City College program that gives them the opportunity to refresh their genetics know-how and to brainstorm new ways of getting ideas across to kids.
"The program is in place because there's been such phenomenal growth in the area of genetics," said Jonathan Brosin, Sacramento City College biology teacher and coordinator of the program. "The teachers we're seeing right now vary from the first-year teacher to people who have been at it for 37 years, and we and they're being asked to teach modern biological concepts that, in many cases, weren't known when they graduated from college."
The Sacramento-area teachers, who receive a stipend as well as funds to improve their schools' science labs, spend two hours in lecture and two hours in lab Monday through Thursday for a month. The Biology Institute was started last year as part of a larger, UC Davis-run project called the Undergraduate Biological Science Education
Project, which receives funding from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
Science education and literacy
The larger education project, directed by microbiology professor Merna Villarejo, originally sought to improve science education and literacy on the UC Davis campus and then expanded its interest to the community college level to influence possible transfer students. The Biology Institute came about as an effort to further extend that educational effort to high-school students.
The fact that topics like DNA fingerprinting and cloning are all over today's headlines makes genetics a field that is easily brought back into classrooms.
"That is one of the reasons why this program got the grant, I think," said UC Davis genetics professor Jeanette Natzle. "These teachers have to teach the whole range of biology, and most of them can't spend a very long time on genetics. But it is an area that can be integrated into other units. It has so many ethical implications and ideas that are useful topics of discussion."
Phyllis Peck, a science teacher from Fairfield High School, says she believes DNA is going to be one of the major topics in biology for the 21st century.
"The more we learn about it and how to manipulate it, the more important it becomes that we get the morals and ethics in place so that the science doesn't get abused," she added.
"One of the things I've stressed strongly is a major change in the way we think about chromosomes," said UC Davis Professor Scott Hawley. "We used to think about chromosomes as trucks--that they were just great big moving vans of DNA, tugged around by simple motors. We now know that chromosomes are much more complicated than that, they're more like electric subway trains."
Hawley said knowing about chromosomes can give insight into some very common and often tragic diseases.
"I want to try and give these teachers a way to go back and talk to students about chromosomes in terms of things that impact students' lives right then," he said. "There are very few kids in high school who don't know about Down's syndrome or cancer and who haven't begun to wonder why it happens. We'll talk to them about why having an extra chromosome is such a problem, and what kinds of chromosome changes underlie cancer."
"The lab component gives people the chance to try out new techniques that they might not have had the chance to do at their own classrooms," she said. "That's one of the main goals of the program, to give people experience in different types of genetics, and have them spend time working together to try and adapt some of the ideas we're working with to the classroom."
In order to "test drive" the concepts and techniques the teachers have developed over the summer, the Biology Institute runs a two-month program during the school year called the Saturday Academy. About 20 area high-school students give up their Saturday mornings to come to Sacramento City College and learn about genetics. Their feedback on last year's program helped Brosin and other instructors change the curriculum for this year so that high-school students can get the most out of what their teachers learn from the institute.
"The kids are the guinea pigs to try out new lab exercises," said Natzle, who also takes part in Saturday Academy sessions. "They really enjoy it. It's also a chance for the teachers to observe each other and their teaching techniques."
As well as finding the Biology Institute a rewarding experience, the faculty also see it as a way to fulfill a civic duty.
"I think that one of the great responsibilities that scientists have is to communicate what we do," Hawley said. "Here's an opportunity to talk to teachers who are really out there on the front lines, an opportunity to learn from them and to have them tell us how we can do a better job."
Jessica Utts, faculty assistant in the new Office of Academic Outreach, said she believes the UC Davis faculty members should be commended for their activities.
"The goal of our office is to foster the beneficial exchange of knowledge between the university and society, and this program is an excellent example," she said. "The researchers, teachers and students are all benefiting by teaching and learning from one another."
Fairfield teacher Peck emphasized how essential it is to adapt one's teaching to a society that is increasingly influenced by science and technology.
"When I went to school it was important to learn how to classify things; it was important to know the difference between a mollusk and a clam," she said. "That's not really critical now. Hopefully we teach our students to think. They need to know about cancer, they need to know about DNA."
Jessie Seyfer, a senior majoring in physiology, is the News Service's science-writing intern. (Neil Michel/Axiom Photo)
