Biocore program turns 40

An innovative undergraduate biology program on campus is celebrating its 40th birthday.

The Biology Core Curriculum programBiology Core Curriculum program, often known as Biocore, is an intercollege honors biology program started in 1967. A 40th anniversary celebration and open house will be held from 3:30–5:30 p.m. on Friday, May 9, on the third floor of Noland Hall.

All faculty, staff and students involved with or interested in learning more about the program are welcome to attend, as are all alumni of the Biocore program. The celebration will include tours of new laboratory facilities, lab demonstrations, and information about Biocore Outreach Ambassadors, the Biocore Peer Mentoring program, student research and the Biocore Prairie.

Biocore is a four-semester sequence of lecture and laboratory courses, developed to encourage students to view science as a dynamic process and to focus on critical thinking rather than memorization of facts. The program draws faculty and students from biological disciplines across campus, including the colleges of Letters and Science and Agricultural and Life Sciences, and the School of Medicine and Public Health.

In its first four decades, the program has taught roughly 6,000 students, many of whom have gone on to graduate or medical school.

For more information about the program or open house, contact Biocore associate director Janet Batzli at jcbatzli@wisc.edu, 263-1594, or visit http://www.biocore.wisc.edu/biocore.