Jolie Stepaniak and Paul Root two professors in the Henry Ford Community College (Mich.) Science Department--have won the Innovation of the Year Award from the League for Innovation in the Community College.

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Jolie Stepaniak and Paul Root two professors in the Henry Ford Community College (Mich.) Science Department--have won the Innovation of the Year Award from the League for Innovation in the Community College. The League created the award to recognize college faculty and staff members who have designed and implemented a significant innovation. Gail Mee, president of HFCC, introduced this program to the college five years ago as a method of encouraging dynamic and innovative thinking among college faculty. Stepaniak and Root's project, "Teaching Biotechnology Through Real-World Projects: Organism Identification Through DNA Analysis," was one of four nominees at HFCC. A committee of 11 HFCC faculty and staff-members served as the judging panel. Students in their biotechnology course, "BIO 261: Nucleic Acids," had to identify an unknown organism through its DNA alone. Each student received a swab of cells from a human being, a chicken or a cow. At that point, they had to design and execute an experiment to determine the organism from which the cells came. The students implemented the polymerase chain reaction, the same process that forensic DNA labs use, to find the answer. This experiment not only tested the experimental design and laboratory skills of students, but also provided them with a fun and exciting real-world challenge.