ANN ARBOR—The study of human genes has dramatically changed how health issues have been explained and treated during the past 20 years. But educators have done little to teach future generations about the concepts behind those scientific breakthroughs.

Building on a previous program involving the University of Michigan School of Public Health and School of Education, Michigan State University in partnership with U-M and others, will create learning materials about genomics and evolution for the nation’s middle school students and their local communities.

Researchers are using a $1.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to introduce the program in Detroit and Flint.

“It’s not only children—studies show most Americans do not fully understand modern concepts in genetics such as the importance of both genetic and environmental factors in shaping behavior and disease risk,” said Louise Mead, education director at the BEACON Center for the Study of Evolution in Action at MSU, and a partner on the project.

The new curriculum will blend formal classroom instruction and informal community-based learning to give both students and residents opportunities to apply ideas about gene-environment interactions and natural selection to their lives. For example, participants will learn how lactose intolerance develops in people and what privacy issues are considered for maintaining DNA samples from newborn blood screenings.

“I hope that this project will help students from the Detroit Public Schools and Flint Community Schools to gain a solid understanding of how genomics, the environment and principles of natural selection combine to affect their health, will help eliminate the racial and gender gaps in science learning, and will spark interest among minority students to pursue and enter careers in science and health,” said Toby Citrin, director of the Center for Public Health and Community Genomics and adjunct professor of health management and policy at the U-M School of Public Health.

Collaborators include the CREATE for STEM Institute at MSU, U-M School of Public Health, Detroit Public Schools, Flint Community Schools and the Concord Consortium, a nonprofit research organization in Massachusetts. In addition, museums, libraries and other organizations will provide venues for learning activities that help increase parent engagement and public knowledge. Partners include the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, Detroit Public Library and Friends of Parkside in Detroit, and the Sloan Museum, Flint Public Library and Community-Based Organization Partners in Flint.

“This project supports our goals in promoting diversity in the science community by stimulating interest in science careers and narrowing the achievement gap in science for underrepresented minorities and women,” said Jessie Kilgore, assistant superintendent of Flint Community Schools.

In the previous work to develop a modern genomics curriculum for high school biology classes, led by MSU Professor Joseph Krajcik and the U-M team, the research made it clear that high school students need a prior foundation linking the concepts of genetics, gene-environment relationships, evolution and human health. The Next Generation Science Standards, now being implemented by many U.S. science teachers, emphasize science practices that help even young students explain complicated phenomena around them.

“Fortunately the NGSS, which include the core ideas of evolution and natural selection, present us with an opportunity to develop curriculum materials for middle school students,” said Krajcik, principal investigator on the project. “As students move from upper elementary to higher grade levels, they can appreciate that human illness need not only be caused by germs and that a combination of environmental factors, poor health habits and genetic influences may also be at work.”

Citrin will coordinate the informal education (museums, libraries, community-based organizations) activities. Other U-M collaborators: Laura Rozek, associate professor environmental health sciences and co-principal investigator, will provide the genomics content of the curriculum; Ella Greene-Moton, community education coordinator in the SPH Center for Public Health and Community Genomics, will serve as principal liaison with the community-based groups, working with them in developing their activities; and Stephen Modell, research and dissemination director at the U-M center, will be the project evaluator.