Episode 3: Innovation in Education

In today’s episode, we’ll hear from a new Dothan City Schools partner, HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology. HudsonAlpha’s Educational arm brings engaging hands-on resources and programs to students, educators and the broader public - showcasing the application of genetics and biotechnology in agriculture, human health, and other career fields.

Transcript

Meaghan Paramore (00:02.222)
you

Meaghan Paramore (00:14.904)
Welcome to It Means More, the stories behind Dothan City Schools, where we explore the extraordinary dedication and innovation happening in our classrooms and communities every day. I'm Megan Dorsey, Public Relations Officer for Dothan City Schools, and today I'm joined with my guest co-host Ryan Richards, a Career Tech Administrator for Dothan City Schools. And today we're discussing innovation in education, highlighting the innovative

programs in our classroom that set Dothan City Schools apart. Thank you Megan for that introduction. So in today's episode we're going to hear from one of Dothan City Schools newest partners, Hudson Alpha Institute for Biotechnology, which also includes Hudson Alpha Wiregrass. The Hudson Alphas educational outreach team brings engaging hands on resources and programs to students, educators and even the broader public and community showcasing the applications and importance.

of genetics and biotechnology and agriculture, human health and other career fields. So joining us today, we have several guests and I'd to introduce them at this time and you'll hear more from them as we go throughout this discussion. So joining us today is Kelly East and Kelly is the Vice President of Educational Outreach at the Hudson Alpha Institute for Biotechnology. Also Dr. Josh Clevenger, who is the Faculty Investigator at the Hudson Alpha Institute for Biotechnology.

Ms. Keely Brewer, who is the biology teacher at Dothan High School. And then we also have Vicki Corretto, who are students at Dothan High School. Thank you guys for joining us this morning. All right, so we're gonna jump right into the questions. So Kelly, I'm gonna start with you. So kind of just a broad overreaching question. Can you tell us about Hudson Alpha, the Hutzville version, and then how Hudson Alpha Wiregrass kind of came to be and the vision behind that? And then what we're kind of doing here today and how this all got started.

Sure, Ryan, I'd be happy to. So Hudson Alpha Institute for Biotechnology, kind of the origin story there takes us all the way back to nearly two decades ago. And as you mentioned, Hudson Alpha began in Huntsville, so on the other end of the state of Alabama. And it was founded through the vision of two founders, Jim Hudson and Lonnie McMillan, who envisioned a place that would be unique, that

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would do not just one thing, but do several things really well and be a place where different people can come together that might have different skill sets, different perspectives, and come together to do big things and solve big problems. Hudson Alpha is a nonprofit genetics, genomics research Institute where we do a whole lot of scientific research, but also at Hudson Alpha, it's a place where we make discoveries, but we also do a lot of innovation.

and thinking about how do you take those discoveries and do something with them that truly makes the world a better place. And also a place where we do education that is engaging with the community, getting them excited about genetics and fueling the workforce that we need at places like Hudson Alpha and elsewhere, the workforce of tomorrow. So Hudson Alpha is this interesting, really special place that does research, it does innovation and industry, and it also does a lot of education.

all around genomics and DNA. So we were founded up in Huntsville nearly two decades ago now and have been thriving up in North Alabama. But closer to two years ago, Hudson Alpha Wiregrass was born. And Hudson Alpha Wiregrass is a part of the larger Hudson Alpha Institute for Biotechnology. But specifically, it's an opportunity for Hudson Alpha.

and all the things that we do, the research, the industry and the education to come down to the Wiregrass region of Alabama and bring those skill sets and bring that work and really invest in that area of the state and grow something really special in the Wiregrass that's unique and specific to the industries and the community there. That's awesome. And I can attest, you know, I have had the pleasant opportunity to spend a little bit of time with you guys in Huntsville.

and what this organization, this company, this innovative group of people have brought to that community is outstanding. And I'm excited personally about the future of what Hudson Alpha Wiregrass is going to do for not only Dothan and the outlying communities, but the Wiregrass and the Southeast part of the country in general. I know that ag is a main focus of what we're doing here and we're in the middle of the peanut capital of the world. And so it's exciting to kind of hear and see all of the new things that you guys are bringing to the table in terms of research and biogenetics. One of the things that we

Meaghan Paramore (04:53.122)
I want it. are mainly going to talk about today is the peanut project. So can you kind of share a little bit about the peanut project and where it started, the schools that you're involved in and kind of what it looks like from the, from the beginning stages to kind of where we are today? Absolutely. And I'm going to quickly pitch this over to Dr. Clevenger because the story of the peanut project really started through a conversation where Dr. Clevenger came to me and our education group and said, Hey, I've let's work together. I've got an idea for how we can take.

the science that I'm doing and take it into the schools and do something really innovative and new. lot of what we, you know, what we're trying to do with Hudson off a wire grass is take things and lessons learned and programs that we've been running successfully in Huntsville and bring them to the wire grass. But this is different. This is not something that we have learned how to do and fine tune up in Huntsville. This really is an innovative program that we are building and learning as we go in the wire grass.

So Dr. Clevenger, can you kind of speak to that origin story and really talk about what the overarching scientific goal is behind the peanut project? Yeah, thanks, Kelly. So it really comes from a place of need and an opportunity to utilize talent and expertise to fill this gap. And so in 2008 now, the peanut industry led by

Lars Wrigley wanted to sequence the genome of peanut and why they wanted to sequence the genome of peanut, which was crazy because at that time the human genome was sequenced and like rice and Arabidopsis. to go from, and I think corn was just being finished. So to go from those big models and human beings straight to peanut was kind of a wild thing. And they spent the next 10 years and

and more than six million dollars to sequence the genome of peanut. And the reason why they wanted to sequence the genome of peanut is because they wanted to help use that, what would they call map of the genome to use genomics to accelerate the improvement of peanut varieties in a new and profound way. Not to be alarmist, because I'm not trying to be alarmist, but over the past 10 to 15 years, peanut yields have been completely flat.

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meaning there has not been any increase in average peanut yields in the United States, yet the inputs and the amount that farmers have to spend to grow those same amount has been rising every single year. And so really what they wanted to do was provide this resource for peanut breeders to produce the varieties that would start increasing sort of the...

on investment for the growers. And the growers in the wire grass region are mostly growing peanuts, right? So this is where most of the peanuts are grown in the world. And so as a faculty investigator at Hudson Alpha who came and took a job to do translational genomics for crop improvement, and I happened to come from the peanut industry and we started talking about what we might do with Hudson Alpha wire grass and me knowing that the education outreach team

was world class and their ability to translate sort of science into experiences. He felt like, okay, well, we need to take this genome that the industry spent 10 years and millions of dollars producing, and we want to use it for why they wanted to produce it in the first place, which was to use genomics to accelerate the improvement of those peanut varieties. And hey, we have this world class educational team.

And we have this great community that wants to try something brand new, because this is completely brand new, where we're actually doing the breeding program within the high schools and the students are learning about what that means and also participating. And we are actively producing new varieties. So that sort of was this like really nice sort of opportunity meets need meets talent. That's sort of like, hey, you're really lucky. Well, you know, we did all this preparation.

to all come together and the people of Dothan in the schools, which has been for me the most amazing piece, seeing the teachers and the administrators like want to allow this sort of cacophony in their programs, you know, cause as Kelly said, like the first year we did it, that we really, just were like, all right, this is how we think we'll do it. And then we, you know, and now we're in our fourth semester and it's like, it's, can see how it's smoothing out. So it's a really awesome example of a group of

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people in a community that want to embrace something new and a group of people that want to try something new. And then here's this great need and all this effort that went into doing it and it all come together. And I don't know, it's pretty special in my mind. So that's sort of how it got started. And so what the project looks like is it's this collaboration of Hudson Alpha education and Hudson Alpha science led by Dr. Josh Clevenger and what he's trying to do from the science side of things.

doing that work as he said in the schools. So we come to the schools and into a school that's participating in this program is gonna do kind of three big steps. Although really the students are doing a lot in between those steps in the classroom as well. But we are intersecting three different times where they are being given a penis that they plant and they grow them up for several weeks and take good care of them to seedlings. then.

We come in and our students can probably attest to, they do a not easy, not fast lab experience where they are responsible for getting the DNA, getting the genetic recipe out of leaves of their peanut plant. And they need to do that in a very high quality way because that sample's coming back to Hudson Alpha into our laboratories and.

going on sequencers so that we can read the genetic code of each of those individual peanut plants. And then finally, the last step, the students get the data back. So after that DNA has been read and has been analyzed, the students see the results of that data and ultimately are responsible for thinking about and making decisions that are gonna inform what Dr. Clevenger and his team do next in terms of breeding and.

which of those peanut plants they think are the most important ones that are solving the problems that they are seeing, that they're hearing about, that they think are important to solve in their community. That's awesome. And Dr. Cleverger, I want to go back to something that you mentioned that I think is incredible and kudos to you and your team and Hudson Alpha in general of seeing a problem where you said that the peanut average yield was flat, right? But the money, the time, the effort, the resources that were going into it to increase that was not cost effective or sustainable.

Meaghan Paramore (11:42.808)
for you guys to get out there in the field with the growers, with the farmers, where sometimes those teams don't often collaborate, right? There's a great divide. So seeing how this project is connecting to communities that typically in the past haven't been in the same room is awesome. And so Ms. Brewer, I want to turn to you. So kind of in a funny way, what were your thoughts when someone walked in and said, hey, you're going to help us with a peanut project? Like, what were your first thoughts about this whole thing?

Well, I really didn't know what to expect at all. In fact, when they came in for the DNA extraction, I knew that they had a series of steps and they had done this before, but I had not seen any of the steps and I was just along for the happy ride of it all. So when I saw the steps were like 30 process, 30 parts of the process, it was a little overwhelming at first, but the kids jumped right in and did a great job. And of course the staff at Hetsan Alpha really helped kind of break it down in a way that they could understand it.

wonderful for them to get to be a part of the project and see all of the different aspects of biotechnology that go into making some of these decisions. So it was maybe a little overwhelming at first, but once the project started, you could tell immediately it was going to be a worthwhile thing for us to do. Absolutely. And I know one of the things is for me, it was this way when I was a classroom teacher of this is just one more thing to do. It's just one more thing on the list.

So, and I know you're our AP Biology teachers. So how well has this project really just come alongside and been essentially co-curricular, if you will. It's been a great asset to your toolbox to teach the content that's really involved in that program. yes, for sure. There's a lot of biotechnology in the AP Biology curriculum.

So it fits along nicely with that. It gives the students an opportunity to use some of the equipment as well as just really bring up interesting topics. They hear about artificial selection when we discuss evolution and they hear about all the different biotechnology components, but to see it kind of put together in a really practical aspect, I think it really helps to make the growth of the peanuts something that's relevant for them.

Meaghan Paramore (13:51.438)
and also for the communities because they know farmers and they hear about the peanut festival. So it just links everything together from the real life to the actual curriculum and therefore it's a little bit more meaningful. Yeah, you know one of the things that we had a discussion on and Kelly you're part of this in very beginning is you know Dothan's known as the peanut capital of the world. I mean to the point where we have a festival about it for an entire week right? But to some degree we take advantage of that or

or we don't see the value and it's just something that we eat on the weekends, right? So in terms of the science behind it and the plant and the products that it produces, Ms. Berger, like for you, like how have you seen your students learn more about this plant that we're so famous for? Like how have you seen them get better involved or more knowledgeable about something that's so important here?

Sure. Well, I think first just seeing it grow in a classroom is meaningful. You see it in the field and you drive by it, but then they also drive by cotton in a similar time of the year. And sometimes students don't know how to differentiate between those or what it would look like in the field.

and then to think about actual problems that the farmers might be facing. And so once the DNA has been sequenced and they come back for the third time to really evaluate what traits the peanuts have and whether or not they should be continued to be bred, that's really nice because they get to think about the local issues that our farmers face. Is there an issue with nematodes? Is there an issue with fungus? Is there an issue with a tomato spotted wilt virus? So it gives them a lot of opportunities to think, well, what are the problems in our area? And then also what are the problems globally?

and how might we go through and allow for a better product to be made to help our local farmers, but then also to reach out and have a global impact. Yeah, I think that's a great point that it extends the idea of the peanuts as being just a local product and the global impact. And I know that's one of the things that when the first time we did this with the Hudson Alpha educational team is you guys really discussed the importance of how this is a global product.

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and how it can solve hunger issues across the world by simply creating better products. Dr. Clevenger, kind of back to you, one of the things I want to ask is this is an extremely innovative approach where it's not very often you have high school students who are intimately involved in this type of research, this type of science, where their data collection and analysis and extraction of DNA can completely change the world economy and our food products.

So like, how do you think this is gonna help impact the educational innovation around that?

Thanks for asking me that question. think Kelly would have a better answer. So I'm going to try and answer then I'll let her sort of maybe give a better answer. think for me, yeah, as you said, I don't know if there's project quite like it anywhere. I mean, there's a lot of projects where they do citizen science and they incorporate education with sort of cutting edge technologies. Maybe they bring us and we have been very

We have been very strict with with taking their recommendations and I have to say most of the time it's what I would have done anyway, which is super cool to see as well. So they like taking that information. They're obviously thinking about it in those in those third visits. I've gotten to go to many of them and the students like are very serious and when they talk about what they think the. They they they would do. They have reasons for that and those reasons are based on things that we've talked about and sort of.

understanding the process of if I am breeding any kind of plant, what is my thought process? And what I think is pretty profound as well, and you mentioned that, is the fact that peanuts are one of the largest oil seeds grown in the world. Billions of people rely on them for nutrition. And what's crazy and interesting from a biology point of view is many of the problems that we have here are problems that

Meaghan Paramore (17:47.53)
Exist in all these other growing regions as well. And so you are able to do this development in the classroom and the students sort of help drive that development and learn about it and are engrossed in it. And then those products can be shared with partnerships. And again, one of those opportunity meets a need, you know.

At Hudson Alpha, we're very globally integrated. We have that network across the globe. And so we're already sort of working with folks in many different countries to be like, hey, we have some stuff material that might be useful for you. And it's coming out of this program. So yeah, it's it's it's sort of changed the way there's two things. And then I'll send it to Kelly. I'm writing a paper right now where I make the comment that that this project and this sort of way of thinking about crop improvement is not only

sort of innovative from an educational perspective. But for me, it's innovative from a scientific perspective where breeding and crop improvement has been in an ivory tower at a university or at a company where they're not directly working with their stakeholders. Now they're listening to them and they're taking their advice and they have relationships with them, but they're not like directly working with them. And it's thought of something that had to be somewhere else. It was in this other place. Whereas we're really doing it all together.

And so like the concept of like real deal variety development that's competitive and we have a variety trial of our first release out there with the best peanut varieties in the United States that's competitive. What everybody else is doing as part of a program like this is is is is pretty interesting and to think about scientifically as well. So now I'll pitch over to Kelly.

You're absolutely right. And as we think about the things that we will learn from this project, hopefully, you we're learning a lot about the science of peanuts and trying to solve big problems for science and for farmers in the agricultural industry. Where my brain, where my hat comes from is thinking about what can we learn about the impact of doing this type of program on students and teachers and schools. Thinking about the fact that Hudson off of Wiregrass and Dothan City Schools and our other partners down in the region.

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that this is something that we can be really proud of that we are learning and doing together and being innovative on that educational side of things. And so we get to be in the classrooms and I know Ryan, you've been in the classroom some with us too, and we see the impact because we get to talk to the students and we get to see their knowledge, their skills, their confidence grow. we get to see that impact, but we also want to be able to capture that impact.

in a way that we can share it with other people, that we can stand this program up as a model for how science and education can come together in a really beautiful way, whether that's peanut genetics research or whether that's any kind of STEM field where you've got scientists that are solving big problems and kind of encourage and create a model for how you can think about bringing that more into schools in an

authentic way. It's not uncommon that in science classrooms students do labs, they do simulations, they get to try on those science skills. But this is an opportunity where students are actually becoming scientists, that there's not an answer key, that they're really actively doing the science and contributing to that work in a classroom that is scale. Dr. Clevenger mentioned that there are other people out there that are engaging

citizens or students that are doing, you know, internship programs or those kind of things where it's very one-on-one where they're tackling and they're getting to embed into science or work. But this is a way where we come alongside whole classes where, currently we are in this school year doing this program at 10 different schools across the Wiregrass region and looking for how we continue to grow that out.

where we can have an investment and an impact on a lot of students through a single program. Yeah, and I think both of y'all brought up really great points on both ends. And one of the things I want to pull back out of that is the two parts where one, it's authentic learning. Like it's real, it's tangible, it's not a book, it's not a video, it's them actively participating. And then something else you said, it's real science. They're being real scientists. Like there's no right answer. So Ms. Brewer, you can probably attest to this. Like when you get into those steps of

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You don't know what's gonna happen, right? You don't know what the answer is gonna be. You don't know what the data is gonna tell you. So there's no real theory yield like most prescribed labs have, right? You do all of these steps and here's what you expect to get at the end. And so there is none of that with this project to some degree, which is kind of the fun part. So Vicki, you're one of the students who've been a part of this project. Hopefully you now kind of know a little bit more about the background of this project. So I'm sure this has helped you learn a whole lot more about the project. So just from a student standpoint, very high level,

What are your thoughts? What has been most interesting to you about this whole project? I feel like this project was really good for us. We were able to learn more about our community and our farmers locally. And I feel like it's really good that we're able to help them. And from this project, we were able to see the impact it has on the peanuts and everything that we grow. I feel like it was a really good project for us as students to be able to do and take hands on on it. I like it was a good opportunity. That's great. So as far as the lab.

Right? Because Ms. Brewer's already said she looked at it the first time. It was a little overwhelming, 30 something steps. In totality, how did you feel as you were going through the steps of the lab and the intensity of it or all that was involved and like the real science? What are some of your thoughts on that? I feel like the Houston Alpha team, they prepared us really well for each of the steps. They had each slide for us and they would guide us through. And I feel like they really made the process really easy. Each, some of it we had already done prior to labs and biology.

So was like, oh, but we actually did it with actual equipment and it was more professional and it was good. Like they really helped us. So something that I kind of mentioned earlier is I think we take advantage of the fact of where we live in the peanut capital of world, right? So what is your new found understanding or appreciation for the peanut crop, if you will, of just how important it is and all of the things that it, resources it provides around the world? feel like it's really important because they showed us like places where like the chocolate, I mean,

where they would use peanuts and chocolates and I was like, they used, and then how hard it is to grow sometimes peanut plants. Cause like my plant didn't really grow, it didn't grow. was like, so then it shows how like the farmers like struggle sometimes to like grow their crops and grow peanuts. And I'm like this really a long process for them to do and put their time into. That's kind of an interesting point that you brought up. So, so how did you deal with the dynamic to the students who

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had the plants that barely made a seedling. They had one little leaf growing out of the ground. And then right beside them, it was a foot long, tall stalk. Like how did you deal with those dynamics and the growth differences?

Well, a lot of that is just luck. And they, think they know that just an extent, you know, they're given a seed and so they can't help but feel competitive because that's just the nature of students. They want to compete with one another and say, mine grew taller than yours. But from my side of things, it was interesting to go back and consider the aspects and talk of it say, well, did you have fungus in the soil? Were we closer to the light? Were there more water or less water? You know, any kind of differences like that to sort of bring up because the

quality of a good science experiment is such an important part of my job as a teacher is to kind of include like what variables are there and what we can control and what might have impacted the overall experiment.

But yes, certainly the students get very competitive and they want to see the plant succeed and be chosen at the end. So Vicki, one of the things that Dr. Clevenger has mentioned a few times is how that y'all's data is impacting what we're actually doing out in field, right? That's impacting the seed production and the plants that are actually being put into the ground. So can you kind of give us some of the highlights of when you guys did the analysis of your final products, when they did the DNA extraction and they ran it through the computer systems?

and kind of gave you the results of how viable that product was. What are some of your thoughts on that? They gave us a list of characteristics that were important to find in a peanut plant. And I feel like it was hard to see all the characteristics we put into one plant. When they were looking to analysis, one had this, but then the other one really lacked another one. It didn't have that characteristic it needed. And I feel like that also why they put the project into work so that they can see a variety of these peanuts and they can choose one that will have the best and best fit. Cause most of them.

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didn't or some of them had good character traits and with other ones didn't have. Ms. Brewer, one of the things that we're hoping to gain out of this whole entire project is obviously the peanut production improve, right? But also the workforce side of this. We want to get students invested and involved in this type of work in this field. Have you had any students share that their interest has expanded or grown or this is something they're really going to try to pursue as a career maybe?

I have heard that. I've heard a few examples of students that were more interested in agriculture in terms of science than previously. think they just, students often feel like if they're interested in science that they don't really understand what a research.

researcher scientists might actually do, or they automatically think, oh, I'm interested in medicine or nursing or, something that's a little more approachable. They don't understand all of the options that are out there if they're doing some kind of biogenetic research. So I think this was lovely because it allowed for them to see, okay, well, here is something that we might see in agriculture in our community. And here is how we could step in as a scientist and kind of impact that area. And then they also saw it in other ways, like, you know, how it might impact education and how it

impact the community and the economics of it. So it was good to see the impact of the science on the students. That's great. So Vicki, what are your future career plans? Is this something you see being a part of your future? No, not really. I feel I want to pursue health science, but not like in a technical way. I want to go into physical therapy, but I feel like during the college I'll have classes that do include like research and like testing out and doing all the labs.

that are similar to this one. So maybe the content itself is not something to pursue, but the application of learning how to process scientific method, I think is important, especially for you wanting to go into the healthcare profession moving forward. So Dr. Cleveringer and Kelly, one other thing that both of you can kind of speak on if you want to is the connection between education, research, but I know one of the third pillars of Hudson Alpha is the idea of economic development. And I know there's a lot of emphasis on that here, especially in the wire grass of

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of we're doing all these things when how do we find the companies to recruit here to help us to continue this important research? I guess I'll start. I mean, from a from a education and research perspective and connection, I think it's it's it's pretty clear and extremely strong, like how you can we can come together and make an impact together. And Kelly's team does this across the institute in many, many, very exciting ways and going to be expanding across in the wire grass as well. Economic development.

It's really interesting you bring that up because there is this really kind of smooth way in which the three things can come together. So in the Hudson Alpha Wiregrass perspective, I have a grant that utilizes my technology that I have developed here at Hudson Alpha for translational genomics to try and make an impact in the timber industry.

which timber in Alabama is much, bigger than peanuts. And so we are trying to find ways to utilize genomics to add value into that industry. We're working with some private companies and just today as part of our meeting and talking about that project learned that there's potentially a new company coming into the area that wants to produce faster growing timber for energy. And they're not going to be making boards or things like that, but just chip.

chip the pine and create energy out of it. And they're really excited about partnering with us because they think genomics can be a big part of their business. And so you sort of have this, if you build it, they will come sort of thing where you have companies that would want to come into the area anyway, because it's a great place to do business. We've seen that, but then they're like, oh, you also have this ability to harness genomics for a way that might be useful for my company. And so there's that like smooth transition of all of us working together.

It just so happens that my program specifically works with dozens and dozens of companies, international companies and local companies to use genomics for them as well. an ability and a history of doing that in the Hudson Alpha brand helps facilitate those connections as well. So it's pretty, it's pretty fun and exciting to see those things kind of happen and sort of like pop out on a Monday morning. Hey, by the way, there's this massive company that wants to come here and is excited about potentially part.

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us and so kind of cool. And from the education side of things, there's a really natural connection point and really critical conversations that need to happen between the economic development and the industry side of things and the education who are the folks that are one of our key missions and the reasons we exist in education at Hudson Alpha is to help fuel that workforce of tomorrow so that we can hear the stories about like the one that Dr. Clevens was talking about.

that we're in tune with what is happening in the field. What are the careers? What's the science? What's the really cool stuff that's happening? So that we can help translate and to share that information with people at higher education, but also teachers and students in the K-12 classrooms to get them excited about what the opportunities are today, what the new opportunities might be tomorrow that don't even exist today and what are those pathways. And it's really exciting.

to be able to not only say, here are these amazing careers, but to be able to follow that up with, and these are careers that are already or may be available in your backyard in a few years, that these are not careers that you've got to move across the globe or across the country to engage with, that this is something that's growing here and that we can be a part of that pathway and providing opportunities like this project as well as others to help.

empower and equip students to step into those jobs. And then we also, as we're recruiting companies, that we've got an answer to their question of where am I going to get my workforce? That we've, we can, that that's a really important part of that industry recruitment. It's funny Sadek, because that's the perfect segue into the question I was going to ask. And you kind of hit high level on it. And any of you can jump in on this question, because I know one of the things that in the very early stages of the Hudson Alpha Wiregrass project was,

How is this going to change our workforce needs? What type of occupations are we going to create that A, don't exist in our economy yet, those future technology driven jobs, but B, what is the research going to create that doesn't exist at all anywhere? And so that was kind of my question.

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What is the future workforce in Dothan and the surrounding communities potentially look like in the future moving forward with this project and its success? I'll jump in and then Dr. Clevenger can follow along that because he is closer to that, the side of that industry in science.

From our perspective, I think that there's so much, there's so much science, there's so much technology in lots of industries and that already exists in the agricultural industry. I know one of the things that we, just from being in the classrooms, hearing students kind of reflect on is that this project has opened some eyes to how much high tech there is in agricultural industries already and seeing where that's going to continue to grow. But one of the things that we are excited about is coming alongside

And thinking about as things grow and, know, we don't have crystal balls, so we can't say exactly what things will look like in five or 10 years, but we're well positioned to, as things evolved, figure out what are those skills? What are those, roles that are growing and how do we empower the local workforce to, to fill those roles, whether that is, degrees, whether that certification, whether that is look something different. And then how do we.

help fill those gaps to make sure that we've got a workforce that's ready to step into the new roles that are coming down the pipe. And I would just add that these technologies that we're working with students on, thinking about utilizing them, physically doing them in the lab, but also advocating for them is the future. Reading, writing, and creating DNA is the future of healthcare, of agriculture, and pretty much everything that we care about.

And, you know, having the one of the things that I see with folks in companies that I work with that some have PhDs, some don't come from different backgrounds or making decisions for very large international companies about how they spend budgeted R &D, what sort of strategies they use to help protect the resources that they need for their

Meaghan Paramore (34:53.121)
products and things like that is the literacy of first of all, how the technology can be useful. Who are the folks that are the best at utilizing it and how much I think about integrating that into my strategy. And so, you know, it's, it's profound and it's hard maybe locally to understand that profinity, but really thinking about using genomics in a really applied way is something that everyone is going to need to know and be able to do.

for many, many, many occupations in the United States, including understanding healthcare decisions. And so it's really neat to think about that because I always tell the students that the things that we do in this program are things that some graduate students getting PhDs might not even do at one time in their program, or they are doing in their program, right? So it's training them to understand how DNA can be effective in their own world.

Yeah, and Dr. Clevenger, you brought up a good point and Ms. Brewer, I think you would agree with me on this and Kelly, you've been around Doth enough to know that, you know, we have a healthcare hub community where a lot of our students just understand and know healthcare because that's all they've ever seen. They have family members that have been involved, but something Dr. Clevenger brought up is the connection of healthcare to agriculture. And what I mean by that is the importance of what you're learning through this project and everything that's going on.

is how that nutrition and diets and allergies all on the crop side of this, but impact the healthcare moving forward. mean, how many times in classrooms do we have students who have peanut allergies, right? How amazing would it be if we could find the right genetic code on the right crop that eliminates the peanut allergy worldwide? Like what type of research that it can lead to all kinds of things like that. So I think it's important for our students to understand that like,

Yes, we may be looking at a peanut crop. The impact that it's going to make on the healthcare community moving forward and forever is going to be dynamic. And so think it's really interesting to kind of

Meaghan Paramore (36:54.836)
see and understand how that stuff works. So I've got one last question and then we'll kind of do a round robin to wrap it all up. So, and Kelly, this is kind of mainly for you. You know, we've mainly focused on the peanut project today. What are some of the other things, extensions and beyond, that the wiregrass is really doing here in Dothan and the wiregrass community? Yeah, thanks, Ryan. And we've touched on a number of those things already that Dr. Clevenger was speaking to some other research interests that are in the genetics and genomics of agriculture, talking about timber and other things that the science

Hudson Alpha Wiregrass is not entirely peanut centric. There's a lot of other really interesting discoveries that are being made in the research laboratories up in Huntsville and the research laboratory there in the Wiregrass. And then the the industry side of things as well of networking and mentoring and recruiting.

companies that are in that ag tech space into the Wiregrass, as well as working on mentoring and growing up new companies in the region too. Putting on my educational outreach hat, this program is a big part of what we're doing in the Wiregrass and it's really incredibly, it's the thing that we are only doing in the Wiregrass. But in addition to that, there are so many other ways for the community to plug in and get engaged with us from an education side of things. And we would love to get to know more of the community.

So during the summertime, this past summer, we started offering student programs. Actually, they're at Dothan High School. You're gracious to let us come into your space and be there this summer offering middle school camps and high school experiences where students can get more exposure to laboratory skills and knowledge and really dig a little bit deeper in genetics. For educators in the community, we go across the state of Alabama doing teacher professional development.

resourcing teachers, giving them materials and content deepening through workshops during the school year as well as during the summertime. So I would love if there are educators listening to this for you to look up and see when you can plug in and get to know us better.

Meaghan Paramore (38:50.412)
and then the community as well. It's really important for us to engage with the whole community because it's not just about empowering students to be the tomorrow's workforce. We want a community that is what we call genetically literate. That as they walk into the doctor's office, the grocery store, they watch the news and they are inevitably going to bump into DNA. That that's not intimidating, that they can approach that and think critically about it and that we can be a resource for them. So we periodically do community education

events that are totally free for folks to come and get to know us and learn more about what's hanging in genetics in both the Wiregrass community and the world writ large. So I hope that Hudson Alpha and Hudson Alpha Wiregrass is the term that people will get to know and get to know us and let us get to them better over the next year and beyond. Yeah and all those things are great and I think the summer camps that we have this year

I know that we're going to continue to grow and expand those. Something else I know you've, you're really kind of on the outside of it, but I know you have a lot of information because the Hudson Alpha Wiregrass team here locally with Dean and Anne and Abby and Madison and the rest of them, the Innovation Center, the Wiregrass Innovation Center is coming. Can you shed a little bit of light on that and what that's going to help hopefully do here in the Wiregrass? I'd be happy to. And I, I,

Huntsville is where I call home, but Dothan has quickly become my second home or home away from home. We spend quite a bit of time down in that area. And every time I come, I love to drive by the construction zone and check on the progress. So as you mentioned, the Wiregrass Innovation Center is a building that is being currently under construction down in downtown Dothan right next to the Museum of Art. It'll run parallel to that building. And that is, it's a building that is actually being built and owned by the city of Dothan.

But Hudson Alpha Wiregrass is the anchor tenant of that space. So it'll be a multi-story building and the majority of the space is dedicated to Hudson Alpha Wiregrass activities. And that includes all three of Hudson Alpha's mission areas. So what that...

Meaghan Paramore (40:50.092)
looks like for me is that we will have teaching space in that building where not only we can run summer programs, but during the school year, we'll be able to offer field trips, afterschool programs, teacher programs, all kinds of stuff that will have a dedicated teaching laboratory, as well as an auditorium that we can also host community events in. For Dr. Clevenger and other faculty investigators at Hudson Alpha.

this will be space where they can have research laboratories where that science and this is already happening in the Wiregrass in temporary space, but we will have permanent laboratories where the science of Hudson Alpha is being done. And then to round out those mission areas, there will be space in the Innovation Center for companies to move into, to grow up in that has desk space and as well as laboratory space for

biotech, agricultural technology companies to work, to grow. And most importantly, and this is kind of the central vision behind Hudson Alpha, is putting the science in the industry under one roof, where you've got the scientists and those leaders of companies that are bumping into each other, having lunch together, getting coffee together, and having those organic opportunities for collaboration and new ideas to form.

to be completely transparent with you that that facility, the Waterhouse Innovation Center is gonna be a game changer for our community for many, many years to come. And I've had the opportunity to meet Dr. Neil Lamb, who is the head of Hudson Alpha and.

Huntsville and his leadership and vision is absolutely incredible. But I've heard him say many, many times that we're at the right place at the right time with the right people. And I think he sincerely means that because our local community with our mayor and our city commission and county commission and our state delegation truly understands the value that in the impact that this organization is going to bring for us in all facets of the game from education to outreach to economic development and beyond. So it's exciting to be in the wire grass at this time. And we

Meaghan Paramore (42:48.194)
thank you and Hudson Alpha for investing in us because y'all could have gone anywhere in the world.

Right. Hudson Alpha is, is world renowned in the research and the value that they bring to the healthcare community. But y'all chose Dothan and the Wiregrass. And we can't thank you enough for that. And we appreciate the leadership and the vision for y'all to see the value and who we are as a community, but also trust Dothan City Schools, right? Y'all could have chosen any other school district, but you partner with us because you see the value that our teachers bring, our administrators bring, and not only, but most importantly, our students, what they bring to the table in terms of their willingness to just jump in and literally get their hands

dirty with the dirt and the mud and all of that that evolves in growing crops and the research that they're bringing to the table. But hopefully at the end, what our farmers and the impact that they're going to have with the crops they're producing, that to solve that solution or to solve that problem that Dr. Clevenger talked about is that yield rate, right? We completely changed that and flipped that where they're outpacing everything that they've done in the past. So again, it's an exciting time to be a part of Dothan City Schools and Hudson Alpha Wiregrass and all that you guys are doing from the educational standpoint.

last question we're going to wrap it up and it's kind of for all three of you just kind of heard this out there. So I want to just ask you from your standpoint personally what does the work mean to you? So Vicki I'm going to start with you so like what do you appreciate that you've been able to do with this peanut project with Ms. Brewer in her class? Yeah so what does the work that you've been able to do with this project mean to you? okay so it means like for me it means a lot.

Cause I feel like the peanuts, I've been going around with them and I always ate them right and never really thought anything about them. And I'm like, oh, when I get to see how these peanuts were, we can be able to change them and make it more better and improve them and make them more safe for us in the community. I feel like this gave me a more open vision to see like, oh, this is really important information that we need and that it really helps everybody around us globally and here in Doton and everywhere else. So I feel like this work really.

Meaghan Paramore (44:52.748)
was really helpful to me. Awesome. Ms. Burr, what about you? Burr, my role as a classroom teacher, I enjoy the work of interacting with the students and seeing how excited they were to be a part of a brand that was not just in our system, but stretched out to a company that they had heard of that is going to have a local branch and the branch in Huntsville as well, but is world renowned.

They were excited to getting to be a part of a larger company, a larger research project and getting to learn those biotech skills that they may not have ever used before or had used maybe in some component of my AP Biology class, but to still see a real life use for them. makes it.

the content a lot more relevant and a lot more important. And it gives them options of seeing what they might do in a career or coming back to work in the future when they finish their four or six years or however long they want to go to college. And so like Vicki mentioned with research, we had even talked about as we have medical students come in,

how if she's interested in something like physical therapy, how important it is to go through and practice research and to have that time as a researcher before you're changing your MCATs. So just saying, okay, well, even if it's not in agriculture, here's something that I can use that is gonna give me a skill that I could apply as I'm trying to get on to whatever career option I have in mind. That's awesome. Kelly, how about you?

Yeah, Ryan. So when, as I reflect back, I fell in love with genetics and DNA. It's sitting in a high school biology classroom of having an amazing teacher that connected genetics to the real world and to the real problems that genetics can help solve. And that's really what kind of got me excited about it. But I also remember, and you know, now we think about Hudson Elf and we think about Huntsville and we think about

Meaghan Paramore (46:56.312)
genetics, but I was in high school a little bit ago before Hudson Alpha. And I remember going to college and studying in genetics and knowing I wanted to do something in that field and thinking, I can't go home. There aren't, there aren't career opportunities, at least not very many of them in genetics in Huntsville that I'm going to have to go somewhere else. The timing of that was really great for me that as I was finishing my undergraduate Hudson Alpha was starting. so

There, that was the answer to that. And Huntsville is home for me. And I've been the lucky recipient of being able to have biotech grow in my backyard and being able to be at home and also do the genetics and the work that I want to do. And so that's something that I'm really excited about that for, to expose students to genetics, get them excited about how genetics can help solve problems, whether that is in a field or whether that's in a doctor's office, that genetics is at the core of life.

that this will be, this is the beginning of a really exciting era of opportunities for students to plug in as they are in high school, as they go through college and they can, you will have internships and those kind of things, then ultimately come back and help build that workforce that we're going to need in bioscience and the wire grass moving forward.

Thank those answers. Thank you all so much for joining us today. Kelly, Dr. Clevenger, Ms. Brewer, and Vicki. It's been great to have this discussion with you guys and I've learned so much. Even though that I've been a part of this project kind of since the onset, it's great to see where we are two years down the road. And so today we've had the opportunity to learn a lot about Hudson Alpha Wiregrass and the education outreach that we've been able to do. And then the innovative techniques we've been able to bring to our classrooms that allow students to feel empowered.

in their educational journey while learning how to contribute to science that impacts not only our local economy but the global economy at scale as well. Next time on It Means More, we'll be discussing nurturing the whole child and how Dota City Schools is addressing the holistic development of students academically, emotionally, and socially. Until then, remember that at Dota City Schools, it always means more.