Students in BSU’s off-campus Biology transfer partnership with North Hennepin Community College (NHCC) collaborated on an end-of-semester poster session on December 7,  presenting their laboratory and classroom research to students, faculty, staff, and administration. Twenty posters covering basic and advanced topics in genetics were created by students in BSU’s BIOL 3930 (Scientific Communication) and BIOL 4930 (Chromatin and Gene Expression), and from NHCC’s BIOL 2360 (Genetics) courses.

The BSU courses are taught on NHCC’s campus near Minneapolis by Assistant Professor of Biology Andy Arsham as part of the Biology Baccalaureate Partnership (BBP), a collaboration between BSU’s Department of Biology and Center for Extended Learning, and NHCC’s Biology Department and University Center partnership office.  BBP students typically co-enroll in core science and liberal education courses from NHCC, including the Genetics class taught by NHCC faculty Dr. Tamara Mans, and upper division Biology courses from BSU.

“I really appreciated the enthusiasm the students showed as they explained their posters.  Their knowledge was impressive and they explained it well,” said Diane Morris, BSU’s longtime lab supervisor, who drove down for the event.  Landon Pirius, NHCC’s VP for Academic and Student Affairs said “it was a wonderful event and display of research.  I really enjoyed talking to the students and hearing them explain their study,” and explained that “some of them started off hesitantly, but really opened up as they got further along in their presentation.”

Professors Arsham and Mans, along with collaborating NHCC professors Craig Longtine and Paul Melchior, plan to have students participate in similar collaborator research presentations every semester as a way to promote student work and enhance the bi-institutional collaboration. For more information on the BBP program, please follow this link.