Blogs

There are several funding opportunities for colleges with an interest in STEM education. We'll keep adding new resources to the top of this page as they appear.

Dec 2022

New S-STEM Solicitation :

S-STEM supports domestic undergraduate and graduate low-income students with academic ability, talent, or potential to pursue successful careers in promising S-STEM eligible fields. Ultimately, the S-STEM program seeks to increase the number of low-income students who graduate with a S-STEM eligible degree and contribute to the American innovation economy with their STEM knowledge.

The new S-STEM solicitation (23-527) has been... Read more

On September 12, 2022 President Biden issued an executive order that launched a national biotechnology and biomanufacturing initiative long in the making. The " Advancing Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Innovation for a Sustainable, Safe, and Secure American Bioeconomy " investment is a commitment to innovation, the economy, jobs, food security and finding solutions to the challenge of climate change. On September 14th, the accompanying summit gave a chance to expand on the ideas presented by the government.

Goals described at the summit and in the White House's Fact Sheet include:

Leverage biotechnology for strengthened... Read more

CRISPRpedia is a free, online textbook that covers CRISPR from its role in bacterial immunity, to its adaptation as a tool for genome editing, and then to its applications in basic research, medicine, and agriculture. The information is made available by Innovative Genomics Institute , edited by Nobel Laureate Jennifer Doudna and other CRISPR experts, and can be used by anyone! The incredible 80+ original illustrations that accompany it can be downloaded and are available for free for non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons license (images such as the CRISPR DNA Target Cleavage, as... Read more

Phase Genomics is creating a database of phage and the bacteria they infect. Viruses that infect bacteria, phage are the most abundant microbes on earth. At the same time, we know very little about the bacteria that phage infect.

Unlike other forms of genome sequencing, Phase Genomics’ technology links phage genomes with their bacterial hosts and can reconstruct both bacterial and phage genomes and their interactions. This is important because the problem of antimicrobial resistance is leading researchers to investigate phage as alternatives to antibiotics. If phage will be used to treat infections, it will... Read more

Contributed by Chander Aurora, PhD and Parvenah Mohammadian PhD, and presented at HI TEC 2022

Background

The best science training programs are those that have a strong connection to industry. Also, programs that provide training developed with local employers’ needs and input are effective in raising participants’ wages and improving employment opportunities. One of the major topics that is stated as being very relevant for employment is acquiring the soft skills. However, most science training programs focus on knowledge-based aspects without much focus on soft skills. Project-Based Learning (PBL), a student-centered pedagogy, has proven to be... Read more

Apply to participate in Cohort 11 We would love to see your college represented!
The goal of Mentor-Connect, supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) is to develop or strengthen technician education programs in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields.

Apply online at: https://www.mentor-connect.org/get-a-mentor/applications/new-to-ate and send required affidavit to Mentor-Connect@fdtc.edu by 11:59 p.m. EST, October 7, 2022 to be considered for this opportunity! Applications will be considered... Read more

BioMADE is the newest of several member based Manufacturing Institutes funded by the Department of Defense to increase public private partnerships. BioMADE is focused on advancing bioindustrial manufacturing to get more products across the Valley of Death to being produced at scale. Bioindustrial manufacturing is distinct from biopharmaceuticals, in that it uses cells, or even cell-free systems, to produce large amounts of chemicals used in industrial applications like fuels, paints and coatings, plastics, rubber, and even cement. BioMADE held its inaugural member meeting at the Science Museum in St. Paul, Minnesota June 13-15,... Read more

"It's not the demand we need to change, its the supply". Words spoken by Dr Bianca Le on the Future Food Podcast of July 16, 2021. Dr. Le was talking about meat, and how the environment can be supported, and animals' lives saved, if instead of investing in movements designed to stop people from eating meat, instead we invest in alternative sources of 'meat without the animal'. I had never thought about the issue in that way, but Dr. Le certainly has. She studied at the University of Monash, Australia and received her bachelor's and PhD there.... Read more

How will biotech contribute to the economy in the future? What roadblocks stand in its way? Schmidt Futures , a philanthropic initiative of Eric and Wendy Schmidt, convened a Task Force to help highlight a path to achieve the promise of the bioeconomy, an economy that will rely on platforms such as engineering biology and artificial intelligence. According to a recent projection , the bioeconomy will be worth between $4 trillion and $30 trillion globally, so this path has the potential to make a huge impact. Their report has been published by Industrial Biotechnology and is... Read more

Agriculture--the word invokes fields of wheat, vines of tomatoes, bales of hay--doesn't it? But agriculture is much more than that today, and the field of AgBiotech is growing so fast there are not enough graduates to fill the job openings. These jobs can be found in labs, or at a desk with a computer, and don't involve weeding. For example, according to the attached file from KCUR 89.3/NPR, Corteva Agriscience has 100's of jobs, and many do not require a four-year degree. The article also says that agricultural economists at Purdue University have analyzed online jobs in... Read more