More high schoolers to discover lab-based research at the Center

Two additional Technology Access Foundation Academy high school students will be able to participate in a unique, year-round science education/internship program at the Hutchinson Center, thanks to two supplement grants from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

This is the second year of a partnership, led by Dr. Beverly Torok-Storb of the Clinical Research Division, with TAFA, a Federal Way public school for students grades 6-12. The new grants bring to six the total number of TAFA high schoolers receiving instruction in the Center’s teaching lab.

A separate award from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases will support four 11th grade biomedical science students from Cleveland High School in Seattle. The Cleveland partnership resulted from the efforts of science teacher Dr. Jeff Shaver, who received a Washington STEM (science education) grant to build low-cost flow cytometers assisted by systems engineers from BD Biosciences/Cytopeia. One of the flow cytometers has been placed in the Center teaching lab, and now Shaver works parttime at the Center to incorporate basic physics, fluidics, electronics and math into the curriculum.
 
Students from both programs study a broad spectrum of techniques and equipment used in biomedical research, which allows them to receive lab experience they normally wouldn’t encounter before the graduate school level.

The teaching partnerships advance the Center’s efforts to help train the next generation of scientists and increase the diversity of the biomedical work force.