Team:Yonsei Korea/Education
Human Practices
Centered On:
Connection
Community
Cooperation
The Yonsei team is a novice in iGEM. Our whole journey beginning with the registration process and up until now has been a roller coaster ride. Taking the initiative to start a new opportunity in a place where almost everyone is unaware of the world wide synthetic biology competition was very challenging. Our challenging moments were not only about finding research advisors and funding opportunities but also trying to transform the school ecosystem into the one that embraces search for new opportunities such as iGEM. To accomplish this we employed several approaches to propagate the ideas behind synthetic biology as well as iGEM within the school environment and beyond.
One of the most accessible tools that would allow us to spread the word was the establishment of our solid presence on the internet. We created our own Instagram page and started sharing our daily journey with fellow iGEMers and local people. This was the best medium that granted us the opportunity to quickly inform people about the hurdles we tackled and progresses we made. We believe that we were able to convey the main purpose of iGEM and synthetic biology research.
Even though social media gave us unrestricted access to a broad range of audience to spread the message about synthetic biology, it was inadequate in accomplishing effective scientific communication. The large size of the audience was the primary barrier to creating effective scientific communication that would inspire people to become involved in synthetic biology related research and intellectual contests such as iGEM. However, we had a very ambitious goal. We aimed at inspiring people to gain knowledge in the new field and take up new challenges. To achieve this, we needed to start small. Being the pioneers of participating in iGEM and representing our university, we decided to focus on the school community, specifically students studying science majors. We believed that direct engagement with the audience would reinforce our previous efforts in achieving our ultimate goal. Hence, we all agreed to give a presentation.
Prior to having a direct interaction with our fellow students, we set two main objectives:
1. To explain what synthetic biology is and how it could be applied.
2. To spread the word about iGEM and its roller coaster journey.
To accomplish these objectives, we wanted to understand our target audience better, so we can produce the educational material in accordance with their needs. On that account, we conducted a pre-presentation survey on students' understanding of synthetic biology and its applications. We designed the survey in such a way that it would give us basic yet invaluable information about students’ awareness, full understanding and definition of synthetic biology, and their sources of information about it.
Yonsei_Korea is a convergent team of students based in Seoul, South Korea striving to create meaningful change utilizing synthtic biology in the IGEM 2021 Competition.