Team:Sheffield/episode8
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OUTREACH |
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The impact of synthetic biology on people's lives primarily depends on their attitudes towards it. To spread the word of antibiotic resistance and how synthetic biology can be used to solve it, iGEM Sheffield 2016 held outreach events aimed at introducing the concept of synthetic biology to 17-18 year olds. At these events, we ran miniaturised iGEM competitions, in which small teams of students had one day to create an iGEM project and present it to a panel of judges. The success of these events encouraged us to write a manual for future iGEM teams looking to host their own miniaturised iGEM competitions.
Working with Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) students
Before running our own large-scale yet miniaturised iGEM competition, we first ran one on a small-scale by participating in the University of Sheffield Discover STEM event, which promotes science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to students from local schools and colleges. For our mini-iGEM, we first gave a presentation to introduce the students to the basic principles of synthetic biology and iGEM, and shared our experiences with the project. Later, groups of students created iGEM projects under the "expert" supervision of our iGEM team members, and presented them to the other students before a panel of "expert" judges (our advisors). These creative students produced exciting and original solutions to tackle issues such as obesity, oil spills, and coeliac disease, using the power of synthetic biology. The event was highly successful, in fact, the event was ranked the highest by the students amongst the other university-run events they attended that day.
The iGEM Sheffield Edu Day
After working with the STEM students we then held another small iGEM competition, but on a much larger scale and informed by our first outreach event; this was dubbed the iGEM Sheffield Edu Day. The Edu Day hosted 46 final year students from 3 local schools, with 8 teams being pitted against each other towards winning the grand-prize - genuine iGEM Sheffield 2016 hoodies!
The iGEM Edu Day was so successful we decided to submit an Edu Day manual, which other iGEM teams can use to organise their own miniaturised iGEM competitions. We hope that the Edu Day can be picked up and improved by other teams in future! Click the link below to download the manual.
