One of my goals is to develop supplementary activities for science teachers to make connections between agricultural and medical biotech in the classroom. Biotechnology is a broad field by definition because it develops products or tools from living systems. This means many basic biotechnology techniques are transferable across sub-disciplines in biology. For example, there are plant doctors or pathologists that use biotech tools to identify and study plant diseases,and these same tools can be used by human doctors to study diseases that affect us.
Through several collaborators, I have developed Ag biotech activities that center around my diagnostic research at the National Agricultural Genotyping Center (NAGC). My favorite group, Education Projects (EP), has helped co-write activities on Ag-related pests and pathogens for their successful GrowNextGen and Nourish the Future projects. EP has given me a voice on the national scale through co-presentations at the NABT and NSTA Conferences and many Ag Biotech Academies that EP leads in several states, including in my state of North Dakota.
I am excited to help teachers develop and use new lessons that encourage students to explore Agricultural career paths, because food sustainablity relies on solving tomorrow’s threats to agriculture.
Zack Bateson, Ph.D. 