How can school leavers find a path into laboratory medicine if they’ve never come across it in class? STEM education that fails to include clinical chemistry and healthcare-related topics is surely missing a trick.
Here, three educators introduce their tried-and-tested strategy for introducing laboratory medicine into school STEM programs.
Learn how you could help to inspire the next generation of laboratory science professionals.
The following transcript has been edited for clarity.
Stephanie Whitehead: Hi everyone. I'm Stephanie Whitehead, the vice president of pathology services at University Health in San Antonio, Texas.
Melody Boudreaux Nelson: And I'm Dr. Melody Boudreaux Nelson, clinical chemist at the University of Kansas Medical Center.
Aaron Odegard: And I'm Aaron Odegard. I'm an educator. And we are excited to preview our session.
Stephanie Whitehead: Yes, we can't wait for you all to attend our session at ASCP in Montreal. The title is Pathways for Clinical Laboratory Education in Traditional STEM Programming. And our session will focus on challenges that we are seeing across the country for most students.
Most students don't learn what clinical chemistry is or that it's a pathway through the STEM pipeline. And oftentimes you're having to make these decisions about courses and majors and careers far before you become an undergraduate. So it's important for children to form that STEM identity in elementary and middle school before they make formal career decisions. And that's what our session's all about.
Melody Boudreaux Nelson: Now, we're going to walk through what the literature says. We're going to walk through some evidence-informed strategies for introducing lab medicine as a concept across grade levels. So, not just high school seniors or freshmen in college, but really looking at that early elementary and middle grade space and highlighting approaches which are grounded in experimental learning, contextualized science instruction, next-generation science standards, and really creating a visibility for laboratory medicine, and other professions within the laboratory community, to help students connect foundational science concepts to authentic applications within healthcare and patient care.
Aaron Odegard: We'll also share the educational design principles behind successful frameworks, including how to build developmental-appropriate activities that fit the nature into existing STEM programs. So early implementations have shown that strong learner engagement improved understanding of the laboratory role in healthcare and increased educator interest in bringing clinical laboratory content into the classroom and the community programs.
Stephanie Whitehead: Yes. And all of our participants will leave with an adaptable, scalable framework for integrating a laboratory-centered STEM education into your diverse learning environments in your own communities. And all of these frameworks are designed to support long-term workforce development and help the learners that you interact with see themselves in the laboratory world of medicine.
Melody Boudreaux Nelson: We're excited to share what we've learned. We've excited to share our approach and really help expand the pipeline of future laboratory professionals. We're looking forward to seeing you in Montréal.
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