The Education Committee promotes awareness, understanding, and education in physiology at all levels, and often works with other APS committees to achieve this goal. This past year has been particularly productive, with both new activities and a continuation of past successful projects.

Graduate Education Professional Skills: A working group representing the Education Committee, Careers Committee, Women in Physiology Committee, and Association of Chairs of Departments of Physiology, has drafted a set of skills that should be developed by trainees at the graduate, postdoctoral, and early career levels. The group is co-chaired by Robert Carroll (for APS) and William H. Dantzler (for ACDP), and includes Francis L. Belloni (APS Careers in Physiology Committee), Vernon S. Bishop (ACDP), Carole M. Liedtke (APS Women in Physiology Committee), and William S. Spielman (ACDP). In fall 2003, APS members will be invited to comment on the draft version of this project in the "Members Only" section of the APS web site. 

Student Member Listserv: A listserv was developed in May 2003 and is being coordinated by the Education Office to provide information and discussion options for student members of the APS. The listserv allows student members to receive notices and information of special interest to them and to carry on discussions outside specific Section listservs. The listserv provides an added benefit for student members. For additional information, contact education@the-aps.org.

APS Archive of Teaching Resources: In its first full year of operation, the Archive has grown in both size and diversity of resources. About 60% of the Archives' 230+ resources are appropriate for use at the graduate and professional school levels. These resources include not only fully catalogued and searchable Advances in Physiology Education articles (N=140) but also graphics, simulations, webs, PowerPoint presentations, laboratory activities, and other resources contributed by individual physiology educators. In January 2003, the Education Office began tracking the Archives usage, as indicated by web statistics and by user registration. Total number of "hits," that is, pages accessed at the Archive website ranged from more than 75,000 in January to nearly 43,000 in March (Figure 1). Although this is the first year these data have been collected, other digital libraries (such as the American Society for Microbiology�s MicrobeLibrary) experience heavier usage at the beginning and end of each semester, when faculty are preparing materials for the next course. The Archive usage stats will continue to be monitored by APS staff. It is encouraging to note, however, that the number of unique users who came to the Archive remained consistently high throughout the spring (Figure 2), ranging from 912 to 1,100. Furthermore, by April 2003, 730 individual users had registered and downloaded at least one resource from the Archive.

Undergraduate Physiology Education

The Human Anatomy and Physiology Society (HAPS). At the May 2003 HAPS meeting in Philadelphia, Withrow Gil Wier, Professor of Physiology, University of Maryland, spoke on "Secrets Of Muscle Physiology: What The Textbooks Don't Tell You." APS member and HAPS liaison, Dee Silverthorn, gave a report at the HAPS business meeting on joint APS-HAPS activities. Silverthorn also presented a hands-on workshop, along with Melinda Lowy and Marsha Matyas from the APS Education Office, on "How to Make a Good Lesson Even Better: Using the APS Archive of Teaching Resources to Enhance Your Teaching." The workshop drew a capacity wall-to-wall crowd of 42 participants.

David Bruce Awards: The Education Committee has completed the development of guidelines and procedures for the new David S. Bruce Awards for Excellence in Undergraduate Research. The awards will be made each year at the Experimental Biology meeting to up to four undergraduate students who have submitted both abstracts for the meeting and award application materials. Jeff Osborn will coordinate the judging of the submitted abstracts for EB 2004

K-12 Science Education

APS Summer Research Program for Teachers. The Summer Research Program continues to work with teachers from across the nation, engaging them in biomedical research; building connections at the local level between teachers, students, and researchers; improving the teaching methods and curricular materials used by the teachers; and deepening the understanding of both teachers and students of how biomedical research is done and how animals are used in research. The program, now in its 13th year, has funding from three NIH institutes: NCRR, NIGMS; and NIDDK, in addition to the support provided by the APS. In addition, George Tempel, at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) coordinates the participation of two to four teachers annually in the program. These teachers are supported by a grant to MUSC from the National Science Foundation. In 2002, the overall program supported the participation of 20 teachers from 16 states in a very intensive, yearlong professional development program.

EB Workshop for Teachers and Students: Education Committee member Walter Ward coordinated the APS workshop for local high school teachers and students at EB 2003 in San Diego. The teachers and students attending had an opportunity to hear an APS 2003 Distinguished Lecturer, John B. West, describe physiology studies at the top of Mount Everest, interact with a career panel that included both an experienced physiologist (West) and two postdoctoral fellows (Martin Farias and Ollie Kelly), have lunch with an APS member and go on a tour of the exhibits and posters with a physiologist. In the afternoon APS members assisted as students explored the factors that affect blood flow and blood pressure via the "Elvis" experiments, while teachers explored two new inquiry-based labs (build a working model of the digestive system; experiment with mechanoreceptors for the sense of touch) developed by APS Summer Research Teachers. 

Local Outreach Team Workshops. In January 2003, the APS K-12 Programs Coordinator Kathleen Kelly, past Summer Research Teacher Sandi Mahl, and experienced LOT leader, C. Subah Packer from Indiana University School of Medicine traveled to Lincoln, NE to conduct a training session for the newest APS Local Outreach Team, led by Janet Steele at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. Since their training session, the Nebraska LOT has already led two workshops in June for local middle and high school teachers.

My Health, My World. In 2003, the APS will complete its long-term collaboration with Baylor College of Medicine's elementary science and health education program. In 2002, the staff and Maryland teachers, home school educators, and daycare directors field-tested the final K-2 unit, "My World and Me." The "My Health" materials have been so successful that a major science supplier for K-12 schools, Carolina Biological Supply, is now assembling and selling both the printed materials and supply kits to allow teachers to more easily implement the hands-on activities.

International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) Awards: The Intel ISEF brings together over 1,200 students from 41 nations to compete for scholarships, tuition grants, internships, scientific field trips and the grand prize: a trip to attend the Nobel Prize Ceremonies in Stockholm, Sweden. The 2003 ISEF was held in Cleveland, OH in May. Special Awards were given by 93 scientific, professional, industrial, educational, and governmental organizations in the form of scholarships, tuition grants, summer internships, scientific field trips, and equipment grants. The APS participates as a Special Awards Sponsor for ISEF, recognizing outstanding high school research projects in the physiological sciences, including cellular physiology, animal physiology, and neurophysiology. Four students receive cash awards ($1,000 First Prize, $500 Honorable Mentions), T-shirts, and a year's subscription to NIPS and The Physiologist. APS is one of the only biomedical research organizations that gives awards to students.

The judging team was led by APS Education Committee member William Jackson and included APS members Michael Romero and Ulrich Hopfer from the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, OH. The judging team selected the following awardees: APS First Place Award of $1,000: Irene Yuan Sun, a senior at Ben Davis High School in Indianapolis, IN.  Sun's project, "Gene expression analysis of synovial cells in response to impulsive shock," also won a Second Place Grand Prize Award in the category of Medicine and Health. APS Second Place Award of $500: Daniel Jacob Sachs won with his project, "Simvastatin activation of ryanodine receptor-mediated calcium channels may promote myolysis." Sachs is a senior at John Jay High School in Katonah, NY. There was a tie for the APS Third Place Award of $500 between Anila Madiraju, a senior at Marianopolis College in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and Truc Thanh Pham, a senior at Suncoast High School in Riviera Beach, FL. Both students will receive $500 from the APS. Madiraju also was awarded an Intel Young Scientist Scholarship, and her project, "Silencing Cancer with RNA," was selected as Best of Category in Medicine and Health. Pham's project, "Effect of age on B-cell responsiveness to stromal cell-derived factor-1 (SDF-1) and B-lymphocyte chemoattractant (BLC)" also was awarded a Fourth Place Grand Prize. 

Refresher Course (Morning) at EB meeting: The Muscle Refresher Course at EB 2003 was organized by George Ordway and Robert Hester. The morning session was extremely well attended, attracting at least 250 attendees, most staying for the entire session. The majority of those attending were faculty at medical schools or colleges/universities who are currently teaching physiology. As has been done for the past three years, an afternoon workshop was held to expand on the topic of the morning session. The afternoon workshop was also coordinated by Ordway and Hester. This year's topic was human exercise and included hands-on demonstrations by a number of exhibitors (BIOPAC Systems, Inc, ADI Instruments (Powerlab), and iWORX). The workshop was highly successful, attracting 50 participants, the most since its inception. For 2004, the Refresher Course theme will be cell physiology. It will be organized by Michael Romero and Jeff Freedman. The afternoon session will again be devoted to laboratory instruction. 

The Education Committee activities would be impossible without the expert leadership of Marsha Matyas and her staff in the APS Education Office. Many APS members interact with the Higher Education Coordinator, Melinda Lowy, as she directs programs related to graduate and medical education. Kathleen Kelly manages the Education Committee outreach activities in the K-12 environment, which increase the vitality and perception of physiology.  Brooke Bruthers organizes the travel and a myriad of other essential functions for both the Committee and the Education Office. I invite you to visit the APS Education Office and its website (http://www.the-aps.org/education/) to learn more about the activities of the Education Committee. 

Rob Carroll, Chair 

Council Actions

• Council accepted the report of the Education Committee.

• Council approved the requested funding for the continuation of the Summer Research Fellowship Program.

• Council approved posting a draft of the Professional Development Skills document on the "Members Only" section of the APS website for comments and suggestions from APS members.