Modern, innovative University of Queensland programs are unlocking research possibilities and opening employers’ doors.
Courses that did not exist ten years ago have become de rigeur for students keen to hit the ground running in the working world. Among these multi-dimensional courses on offer at UQ are computational biology (combining IT, biology and maths), biotechnology (biological and chemical sciences and law) and information environments (design, architecture and IT).
Director of UQ’s Tertiary Education Institute Denise Chalmers said while interdisciplinary teaching was not new, programs were now moving well outside traditional subject blends.
“There is a new conceptualisation, a new approach. The undergraduate programs have been deconstructed so that if you were looking at, say, evolution from a science viewpoint, you would now look at evolution in terms of its biology, its chemistry and its sociology. In that way, the interdisciplinary approach to teaching is more profound.’’
Lecturer in Higher Education, Dr Catherine Manathunga, is the chief investigator of a UQ-funded scoping study into interdisciplinary research education and staff development at the University. Co-investigators include Associate Professor Paul Lant from the Advanced Wastewater Management Centre and Dr George Mellick from the Southern Clinical Division of the Medical School.
Part of their research involves at a UQ research centre, the Advanced Wastewater Management Centre, that is keen for students to have interdisciplinary research experience. Microbiologists and chemical engineers are sharing their knowledge to find solutions to wastewater problems.
Dr Manathunga is also investigating interdisciplinary research education at the Southern Clinical Division of the UQ Medical School. The research teams there combine the skills of researchers from clinical backgrounds, wet laboratory scientists and social scientists.
An interdisciplinary program at UQ’s Ipswich campus, the Bachelor of Information Environments, is in its fourth year and is believed to be unique in the world.
Associate director of the program Alan Boykiw said the first honours graduates would finish this year.
“What we have is something unique because while our students are good at coding and Web design and design and technology, they must also be good at understanding people’s relationships with technology. Central to what we teach is human interaction which is how people relate to physical and virtual environments,’’ Mr Boykiw said.
Mr Boykiw said the Information Environments program was extremely hands-on, with the recent end-of-year exhibition of students’ work at UQ’s Ipswich campus demonstrating the depth and inventiveness of the projects.
Mr Boykiw said the key to the relevance of the interdisciplinary course was the blend of design and studio learning approaches.
“In the design stream, students acquire and practice design process and thinking through physical and computer-interface prototypes from a people-centred perspective. The studio stream allows students to combine skills from other subjects in rewarding individual and group project work,’’ Mr Boykiw said.
Computational Biology lecturer Ingrid Jakobsen, of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, said industry demand far outstripped the supply of computational biology graduates.
Dr Jakobsen, a maths and molecular biology graduate, says the computational biology program kept up with advancing times at the dawn of what had been termed the “Century of Biology’’.
“In biology in the past 20 years, there have been enormous shifts and advances. Experiments use novel approaches, all of which could be done by hand, but in practice, these experiments are done in bulk on automated equipment, connected to computers that read and record the results,’’ Dr Jakobsen said.
“Important breakthroughs have been achieved in understanding and experimental techniques, but the data glut has been achieved because of computerisation and automation.’’
Dr Jakobsen said the path towards unlocking the human genome had also unlocked a whole
lot more.
“Looking at patterns of genes and changes in those patterns over time can be done most effectively on a computer. Data mining _ knowing how to find the core information in the mountain that exists in any study _ is an essential ability of any scientist. We also know that computer modelling of genes is far more cost efficient than doing similar experiments in a laboratory and we can zero in on the interesting genes that need further study, saving time.’’
Dr Jakobsen said the teaching challenge was to design a course that was interesting to students with either maths or biology bents.
“The advantage we have as teachers is that the students can clearly see the usefulness in what they are learning and the prospects for jobs at the end,’’ Dr Jakobsen said.
“My experience is that the really exciting science is interdisciplinary. Everything is changing. No one doubts that molecular biology is a subject in its own right, whereas when I was a student, it was either under the biology or biochemistry umbrella.
“Everything must be transferable — ecologists must have maths skills, computer scientists must have physics or biology skills. In order to explore fully these things now, you must have interdisciplinary understanding.’’
