Collaborations
European Institutions
EMBL E-STAR Fellowship Recipients
ELLS has developed a privileged link with a group of EMBL PhD students who were awarded Marie Curie Fellowships for Early Stage Training (EST). These 18 PhD students, named EMBL E-STARs (Early Stage Training in Advanced Life Science Research Across Europe), are working with ELLS to produce innovative educational material.
The European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO)
ELLS was originally launched as part of an EU funded project Continuing Education for European Biology Teachers' (CeeBT) coordinated by EMBL's sister organization EMBO. The CeeBT project came to a close in March 2005 and ELLS has now been integrated into the larger framework of training activities at EMBL. The fruitful collaboration with the EMBO training programme for teachers continues at many levels through networking, teachers' workshops, development of teaching resources and dissemination of materials.
EIROforum
The EIROforum is consortium formed of seven renowned intergovernmental European research organisations, including the EMBL. It supports important science education initiatives, namely the Science Stage festivals, where teachers present their best activities and materials.
The European Schools
ELLS has an ongoing collaboration with members of the Life Science Curriculum Development Team for the European Schools Network who help develop and test ELLS' teaching resources in the classroom, providing feedback on content and robustness.
National Institutions
Germany
Landesakademie für Fortbildung und Personalentwicklung an Schulen, Esslingen
ELLS organised a series of PERL programming courses for German high-schools teachers in 2003 and 2004, in collaboration with the Landesakademie.
Greece
Hellenic Pasteur Institute Athens
The Hellenic Pasteur Institute, based in Athens, is hosting the first LearningLAB in Greece. The course entitled 'Cutting-edge technologies and their contribution to the future of Biosciences" will be held there on 26-28 June 2006.
Italy
Centro Universita-Scuola per le Biosienze (CUS-BIO)
A very successful collaboration between ELLS and the University of Milan's science education facility, Cus-Mi-Bio, started in 2004 with the first of a series of LearningLABs for teachers 'From organisms to genes' on the 24-26 November. The collaboration has extended to the production of a series of e-learning modules based on the course 'Bioteach-tools and tips for science teachers' in conjunction with CUS-MI-BIO and the Centro di Tecnologie per l'Apprendimento (CTU). The bioinformatics module Bioinformatics approach was launched in May 2005. A follow-up LearningLAB is scheduled for Spring 2006.
Fondazione per le Biotecnologie, Turin
In 2009 the ELLS in collaboration with the Fondazione per le Biotecnologie organized a LearningLAB for European teachers on molecular evolution, held at the Molecular Biotechnology Center on the 28-30 January. An ongoing collaboration is aimed at developing education activities for the next European Science Open Forum (ESOF) scheduled for 2010 in Turin.
Portugal
The Gulbenkian Science Institute (IGC)
Institute of Molecular Medicine (IMM), University of Lisbon, Portugal
In 2004, a collaboration was launched between ELLS and the ICG and IMM in Portugal who co-hosted the first Portuguese LearningLAB at the IGC on 13-16 April in Oeiras. The course 'Inspiring Science' aimed at mid- and high-school teachers, focused on hands-on training in Developmental Biology.
Institute for Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB), Portugal
The Faculty of Sciences (FCUP), University of Porto, Portugal
Two National Institutes, the IMBC and FUCP, based in the north of Portugal, in Porto, co-hosted a LearningLAB 'From DNA to Protein' on 7-10 September 2004. This collaboration is continuing with a follow-up practical course at the IMBC and FCUP in Porto scheduled for September 2005.
Spain
University of Valladolid
With the support of the local education administrators of Castilla y Leon, ELLS collaborated with the University of Valladolid to organize the course for Spanish high school biology teachers "New frontiers in research on genetic diseases: from the lab to the classroom" on 15-17 April 2009.