Educational Alternatives, Volume 18, 2020

Abstract: Today's learning strategies based on life skills, transversal and professional competences, are some of the modern forms of education, which can flexibly respond to the historical moment faced by the education system in the time of biotechnological revolution. The immense achievements in the field of biotechnology have brought the need for educators to develop competence based extracurricular materials on the field. Developing the future competences of the student’s in this field means not only addressing the positive impact of biotechnology in human progress, but also raising awareness on the risks of its use for harmful purposes, against the humanity. Biosafety and biosecurity extracurricular modules can be used and delivered not only to students in High Schools but also to multiple audiences with a very specific goal. Education materials in this field serve to ingrain relevant principle for guiding effective decisions and behavior; to present and highlight the importance of biosafety and biosecurity, and to recognize the impact of their use for a secure future of the planet and life on it. Variations in biosafety training requirements, incident-reporting practices, and attitudes toward laboratory safety…support the development of core competencies in biosafety practices that could lead to more uniform and robust safety culture. In this material we are proposing together with the learning objectives the content that provides the best learning experience for both student and teachers, the timing for each activity, materials that can be used like background documents, and a “common language” between the content and the teacher that will attract the attention of the users. This extracurricular biosafety material offers great promise in the development of autonomous and enduring biosafety knowledge and skills that are relevant, useful, and resilient for both teachers and students.