Developing an education module to teach high school students about bioinformatics and antibiotic resistance
Amy Pickering, Professor
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Applications for Spring 2025 are closed for this project.
The Pickering Lab at UC Berkeley is currently developing SOIL-SEQ, a hands-on education module for local high school classrooms designed to engage students in a crowdsourcing effort to provide data to better understand the spread of bacterial antibiotic resistance through the environment. We are using cutting-edge, portable DNA sequencing technologies to identify antibiotic resistance genes in soil samples and are currently implementing pilots of the module in local high schools. Our team is looking for a student who is interested in helping develop and implement the pilots. Interest and experience in engineering education, specifically in the area of curriculum development and setting learning goals is welcomed. There is also the opportunity to help with lab work for the module, including DNA extraction and sequencing using Nanopore, and in building a website for the project.
Role: Students will assist with implementing the module in local high schools, and in developing evaluation tools. They will also assist with refining the curriculum. Students will learn about antibiotic resistance, bioinformatics, and education pedagogy.
In-person with option for some remote work.
Qualifications: interested in working with high school students, experience with STEM education or molecular microbiology a plus
Day-to-day supervisor for this project: Hannah Wharton, Ph.D. candidate
Hours: 3-5 hrs
Related website: http://pickering.berkeley.edu
Biological & Health Sciences Engineering, Design & Technologies