Biotech labs find their way to local classes via a number of
nonprofit efforts
Local students are getting a taste of cutting-edge technology in
science classes, partly thanks to a five-year grant given to the
Gavilan College Small Business Development Center to create a
biotechnology center.
Initially, Rich Gillis, the director of the Small Business
Development Center, started out looking for a way to incorporate
higher paying jobs in the region, not to hook local high schools
students on science.
Biotech labs find their way to local classes via a number of nonprofit efforts
Local students are getting a taste of cutting-edge technology in science classes, partly thanks to a five-year grant given to the Gavilan College Small Business Development Center to create a biotechnology center.
Initially, Rich Gillis, the director of the Small Business Development Center, started out looking for a way to incorporate higher paying jobs in the region, not to hook local high schools students on science.
“In 2002, the dot-com bubble exploded,” said Gillis, who is also the director of the San Joaquin Biotechnology Center, which is affiliated with Gavilan College and located in the Small Business Administration office in Gilroy. “Unemployment got into the double digits. We were looking for something that would be a good fit for the area, we investigated it and went after it.”
Biotechnology seemed to be the answer.
“I’m not knocking retail, but it doesn’t pay a living wage for the most part,” Gillis said. “It’s a swinging door. You have to hire people and retrain them. It adds to the cost of everything.”
Gillis found that many entry levels jobs in the field don’t require four-year college degrees and the wages are often higher than retail jobs.
“Genentech hires 40 percent of their employees at entry level and they pay $18 -$20 an hour, plus benefits,” Gillis said. “That’s a different level of earning.”
As the director of Gavilan’s SBDC, Gillis applied for a grant from the California Community College Chancellor’s Office to start the San Joaquin Biotechnology Center. The center is located in Gilroy and is one of six biotechnology centers in California created by the CCC’s Biotech Initiative.
The local center is working in 15 counties with 15 community colleges from Morgan Hill to Bakersfield and covers about a third of the state, Gillis said.
SJBC is preparing community colleges to offer biotechnology certificates, including a for-credit program that will begin at Gavilan College in 2007. But the first step included peaking interest in the industry of students before they even get to the college level.
The center launched a pilot program in 2001 to encourage local high school and middle school teachers who were teaching biology and chemistry classes to attend workshops in biotechnology. The center partnered with the Santa Clara County Biotechnology Education Partnership to train science teachers from San Benito High School, Gilroy High School, Live Oak High School and Britton Middle School.
“Kids get to do things hands-on instead of from textbooks,” Gillis said. “They can sequence their own DNA.”
More than 1,500 students in southern Santa Clara and San Benito counties received at least some form of biotechnology coursework in the 2004 school year and the numbers are expected to double this year, Gillis said.
Many of the teachers incorporating biotechnology into their classes were trained through the Santa Clara County Biotechnology Education Partnership. The nonprofit started in 1992 and is located at San Jose State University.
“It was started by teachers who had attended a workshop,” said Katy Korsmeyer, program director of the Education Partnership. “They were getting excited about science and wanted to teach their peers.”
Part of the curriculum for the Partnership’s weeklong training course for teachers is a discussion on bioethics, since some topics such as stem-cell research is seen as controversial.
“Our goal is to have a balance,” Korsmeyer said. “We model teaching to the teachers and they come to their own decision.”
The training incorporates biology, chemistry, engineering and even physics.
“You have to understand some of everything,” she said.
Jennifer Rilea, then a Live Oak teacher who is currently teaching at Ann Sobrato High School, attended her first workshop with the Partnership in 2001. At the first workshop, Rilea heard a San Jose teacher talk about the biotech program at her school.
“She talked about how genetically modified organisms are used in the cheese-making industry,” Rilea said. “My interest was peaked and I’ve been to dozens and dozens of workshops.”
Rilea’s students are getting interested in the subject, too, especially since this year Sobrato High launched a biotechnology course.
“I’ve had students tell me, ‘Ms. Rilea, your class is the only one I enjoy every day,’ she said. “They just see they are doing something different and fun. They deal with things that come up in the news.”
Vera Gomes, a former Sobrato teacher who now teaches at San Benito High School, is incorporating biotech labs into her biology classes with the same effect as Rilea.
“Students get a more hands-on experience, a deeper understanding,” Gomes said. “They get excited about it. They get talking about manipulation and diseases.”
Both teachers have used a lab on DNA fingerprinting in their classes. For the lab, students stain their own DNA and then analyze it. Another lab allows students to transform a bacteria unable to produce a green florescent protein with a gene that can and watch them glow green under an ultraviolet light. Many of the labs deal with the manipulation of DNA or proteins, some of the same techniques used in modifying produce or plants.
One of the drawbacks of the biotechnology labs for local schools is that the equipment for the labs is costly.
“Every school district is limited because the enzymes for one lab might cost $400,” Gomes said. “We aren’t funded. We need these specialty grants.”
While both teachers struggle to fund their fledgling programs, there is some support available to them. The Education Partnership and the San Joaquin Biotechnology Center have some mobile kits that can be checked out by schools so they don’t need to purchase all the equipment. But the kits are shared among many schools within many districts.
Korsmeyer added that one of the founding purposes of the Partnership included helping teachers to fund the expense of biotechnology labs once they were trained.
“We help to support them, getting them reagents, as long as they pick them up from us,” she said. “And we have our equipment-loan program.”
While the equipment can be costly, it is also the consumable items that add up, such as gloves and pipettes used for the labs.
“When I want to use gloves, I tell the kids only the people touching the reagent should use gloves,” Rilea said.
The teacher is willing to take hand outs for her program. She drove to a warehouse in San Francisco to pick up materials that a company donated to the school.
“It takes money to keep it going,” Rilea said of the program. “We need community support and companies to donate things.”
She admits that the Sobrato could have used more funds for the course this year.
“It’s the first time teaching it and we didn’t have all they money we needed,” Rilea said. “The textbook isn’t even out until next year.”
Rilea received a grant in October for $3,500 from the Bay Area Biotechnology Education Consortium that will help with a few of the costs for this year’s classes.
Gomes continues her search for funding as well. She and her fellow teachers wrote up a proposal for a mini-grant offered by the Balers Education Foundation to purchase five pieces of equipment.
“Our campus is so big and we don’t even have enough equipment for each building so we are constantly schlepping things from one to the other,” Gomes said.
The teachers found out Nov. 28 that their grant for $989 was approved and they received a check at the San Benito High School District board meeting Nov. 30.
“We called our proposal IBALERS,” Gomes said. “It stands for ‘Improving Biology Aptitude with Lab Equipment to Reach Science Standards.’ Now when we apply for grants or ask for donations, we can say they are for our IBALERS program.”
While the support organizations are trying to increase student interest in sciences, the San Joaquin Biotechnology Center wants to sustain the excitement from these classes as these high-school students graduate. The goal is to filter them into community college programs in biotechnology and eventually into jobs within the industry.
Gavilan College will launch its Biotechnology Institute in one year. Jane Harmon, vice president of instruction and student services at Gavilan College, said they are looking at their nursing department as a model for the biotechnology coursework.
“We went them to get entry level jobs while they continue on with their education,” Harmon said, in a meeting with state Senator Elaine Alquist Nov. 21.
The jobs within the biotechnology field are diverse and range from biostaticians to animal handlers to forensic scientist, one job that has many kids interested in biotechnology.
Shows such as CSI and other crime investigation shows are part of the reason students are so interested in biotech labs, Korsmeyer said.
“Even middle school kids are watching that show,” she said. “But students see it in the newspaper. They read about real science with stem cell and drugs, the local industry.”
