Biotechnology Laboratory and Skills Training (BLAST)

In order to respond to the needs of south Florida's emerging bioscience industry, this project is designed to bring the Biotechnology Program at Palm Beach State College (PBSC) to full capacity by fortifying key elements in the biotechnology training pathway. Specific targets include increased rates of retention and graduation among biotechnology majors. Activities include: creating an active learning community for students by offering student cohort activities such as student internships and conference presentations; internal recruiting efforts by creating activities to make current students in biology courses but not yet committed to biotechnology aware of the potential of a career in biotechnology and their potential for participating in such a program and by providing professional development opportunities in biotechnology, as appropriate, for both general biology faculty and community college advisors; creating a new General Biology course as a general education course that emphasizes the molecular biology basis of biotechnology, a course that may both attract the general, not yet committed student and that may count towards their AA transfer degree; establishing peer and alumni biotechnology tutoring and mentoring programs to help students get maximum benefit from and progress at an appropriate pace through their course and internship experiences; developing rubrics in order to provide consistent feedback for students as they progress through the program and to assess which students need additional tutoring assistance. As part of creating learning communities the project is: hosting an on campus Bi-Annual Student Poster Symposia and a Biotech Awareness Week; encouraging students to present their work at meetings and conferences; and creating a Student Ambassador Program. The intellectual merit of the program lies in the rigor of the new courses being introduced. The lessons learned from establishing the learning communities represent the broader impacts of the project.